MARBLEHEAD — It came down to the final few holes on the final day of the 78th Annual Tedesco Country Club Fourball Tournament, and Salem’s Bob Ward and his partner Tom Doyle were able to hold off Marblehead’s John Rogers and Eric Suhr to win the trophy.
Club pro Bob Green said Sunday’s wrapup of the 4-day tournament was a great day of golf.
“Great shots, great putts, great weather, and just a fantastic round of golf at the end to win it,” Green said. “We’re very proud of our tournament, it’s our signature event. We can control everything but the weather, (but) the weather cooperated, and we saw some fantastic golf over the past four days.
“Today was a great day of golf, capping off a great tournament,” Green said.
“At the club level, the amateur level, to see such great competitive golf is fantastic,” Green said. “So many great shots, great putts, we had excellent rounds, extra holes, just a great four days of amateur golf.”
Ward and Doyle were friends back in their days playing basketball at Salem High School, and reconnected after their kids started playing together for the Witches hoop team (Doyle is the head basketball and golf coach now). This was their first time as a team in a golf tournament.
“We’ve been friends for a long time, but this is the first tournament together for the two of us,” Ward said. “I’m a member here, Tom is the golf coach at Salem High, he’s a member at Olde Salem Greens, this is our first tournament playing together and it really turned out great.”
Ward and Doyle got to the final round against Rogers and Suhr by beating Tom Burke and Rom Emmons Sunday morning. Swampscott’s Burke tipped his cap to Ward and Rogers Sunday afternoon.
“Those two played great,” he said. “We were down by five shots with five holes to go, we won three straight, but they clinched it with a win on the 17th, those two played really great golf,” Burke said.
Doyle said things worked out just fine for the first-time partners.
“I thought we played pretty well,” he said. “We made some shots and things just turned out pretty well for us.
“We’ve been friends for over 25 years, and we just went out to have a good time on the course and things turned out pretty well.”
Ward said he and Doyle are going to wait and see if this partnership is going to take off now that the two have the Tedesco Fourball trophy for 2017.
“We definitely want to play together again, but first we’ll check with our wives first,” Ward said with a hearty chuckle.
The runners-up, Rogers and Suhr, got by Jim McCathern and Steve Glowacz Sunday morning to make it to the final round. Both said they had a fantastic time in their first time as official teammates in a tournament.
“We played together in some charity tournaments, but this was the first real tournament together, we really had a blast today, just a fantastic time,” Rogers said. “We each made some key shots, some key putts throughout the day, and it was really a great time, a fantastic four days at Tedesco.”
“Eric and I both made some birdies, we hit some good shots, we really just wore down a little at the end, but it was a great time,” Rogers said.
“John’s a member here, (at Tedesco) I’m his guest and Tedesco has been fantastic, they’ve taken care of us every day, the course was beautiful every day, all the holes in pristine condition, just a super time in this tournament,” Suhr said.
Peter Brown and Frank Bertolino, both from Marblehead, were the overall round-a-day winners. “Both teams in the final played great golf, congratulations to all of the golfers,” Green said. “This is our signature event every year and everyone associated with Tedesco puts their heart and soul into this tournament, and I think we had four days of great golf, really a very successful week here at Tedesco.”
