A captain's knock by Waipu's Braden Keown has given Northland junior golfers their first outright win in the Interdistrict Quadrangular.
Keown was down by four with six holes to play in his match at the Grange in Auckland on Sunday but fought back to give his side a half onthe 18th to ensure a 2-1 win over Waikato.
The team of Keown, Julian Fowler, Taylor Gill and Ben Bowmer - the No4 and only player to win all three of his matches - beat Taranaki 4-0 on Saturday and comfortably took care of hosts Auckland 3-1 in the afternoon.
As Waikato were also unbeaten on Saturday, Sunday's match was for the trophy and Keown's half rescued an outright win for Northland.
Team manager Roy Pelsky said Northland shared the junior trophy with Auckland two years ago but this was the first time they had won the trophy outright in more than 25 years of trying.
The senior team went very close to making it a double celebration.
The eight-strong team went into Sunday's final round against Waikato needing only a half to take the trophy after 5-2 and 4-3 wins over Taranaki and Auckland respectively.
Waikato had halved their match with Auckland on Saturday so needed to beat Northland. What followed was a nail biting match.
Northland went behind early but clawed their way back and with a few holes to go had grabbed a slender lead - but in the final two holes they saw it slip away to cop a 3-5 defeat.
Pelsky was nevertheless pleased with the overall result - particularly the rare win over Auckland - but said the players good form had further compounded his selection dilemma for the senior team.
The final selection will follow the Garrard Shield quadrangular on November 10-11 and Pelsky said he has never seen such competition for places in the five-strong (with one reserve) squad.
"There's going to be a couple of very disappointed boys when we make the call ... because it's so close we're going to look at a range of other factors like consistency and team spirit to separate them," he said.
Alex Neely, Chase McKeown, Luke Brown, Kadin Neho and Brett Dormer all had two wins at the Grange and Pelsky is likely to tinker with the playing order for the Garrard Shield.
