Kelly Barker edges Collina to collect McCue Trophy

    Writing from Glenwood, Illinois
    Tuesday, June 24, 2014

    When Kelly Barker saw the tee sheet for the Girls 16-to-18 Division of the 26th Illinois Golfer Challenge Junior Golf Championship, she knew who her main competition would be.
    “I knew Natalie (Collina) was going to be contending,” Barker said of her Palos Heights neighbor.
    Barker also knew she had to keep cool and control her emotions.
    “I’m my own worst enemy,” Barker said.
    Not Tuesday. Not even after her second shot on the par-4 16th, the most difficult hole at Glenwoodie Golf Course, hit a tree and crashed into the creek.
    “Before I would have gone down the drain,” Barker said.
    Tuesday? She had this thought: “Playing as well as I am, I can’t let it affect me.”
    So Barker hit a recovery shot on the green, two-putter for a double-bogey 6, and went quietly to the 17th tee.
    A par 4 followed, and while Barker bogeyed the par-5 18th, her 14-over-par 86 carried the day, winning the bracket, and the Carol McCue Trophy that goes with it, by three strokes over Collina, a Stagg graduate who’ll be a Lewis Flyer in the fall.
    “My teaching pro, Jerry Vidovic, has a saying: ‘You have to get back on the wagon.’ ” Barker said of her recovering from the miscue at the 16th.
    Barker had gone out in 6-over 42, making birdie on the par-4 ninth to finish that side with a flourish, compared to Collina’s 46. Not that she knew it, but that gave her shots to play with, and Collina finished with four straight 5s, good play considering the wet conditions that prevailed all day. Barker played the final four in 22, two strokes higher.
    Mary Yonkaitis of New Lenox was third, firing a 91.
    – Tim Cronin