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Bowling Green State University Athletics
Chris Leake Qualifies for U.S. Public Links National Championship
July 06, 2004 | Men's Golf
July 6, 2004
By JACK CARLE, Sentinel Sports Editor - In golf there's a time to gamble and a time to be conservative.
After a strong opening-round 67 during the recent U.S. Public Links qualifier at Stone Ridge Golf Club, Chris Leake turned conservative for the second 18 holes with his four-stroke lead.
The strategy paid off and Leake is now getting ready for the U.S. Public Links national championship at Rush Creek Golf Club in Maple Grove, Minn., July 12-17.
"I was a whole lot more conservative in the afternoon. (I was) not going at any pin, just going to the middle of the green, taking my two-putt and walking off," Leake said.
Leake, who will be a junior on the Bowling Green Falcon golf team this fall, finished with a 73 for a 4-under-par 140 total to earn one of two qualifying spots from Stone Ridge to the national event.
"It was just a typical morning out there, not too windy," Leake said about Stone Ridge, which is the Falcons' home course. "When I shot my 67, I thought some people would be a little closer than 71."
His putting put Leake in position to shot his 67. He needed only seven putts for the first seven holes and 22 for the entire round.
"There have been days where it just seems everything is the right distance. You don't have to worry about the speed and they all just fall in the middle," Leake said. "It doesn't happen all that often."
Now Leake has his sights set on winning the national event. The field of 156 golfers have two days of stroke play and then the cut is made to the low 64 scores for six rounds of match play.
"He's got a great opportunity," said BG men's golf coach Garry Winger.
Leake will be able to play two practice rounds at Rush Creek before the event starts.
"You always expect when you're at our level to go out and win everything you play in," Leake said. "You have to have in your mind that you are better than all these people and none of them is going to beat me."
He's concentrating on his short game in preparation for the Public Links championship.
"You have to keep practicing when something comes up like this, but you don't want to practice too much," Leake said. "I hit it far enough ... I just have to be chipping and putting well.
"It's just a matter of, if you're playing well and your timing is good on certain days."
Leake works on his short game at the practice green, playing only five or six holes nightly at Stone Ridge.
"What we work really hard on is wedges," Winger said. "With this game that they're playing now and as far as young guys hit it, basically if you can drive it, wedge it and putt it, you can play this game.
"You hit a lot of wedges in a round of golf from different yardages," Winger added. "The biggest thing is to have good distance control with your wedges."
Leake said he started playing golf when he was 3- or 4-years-old with his father Don, who will be his caddie in Minnesota. In the eighth grade Leake qualified for Junior World Championship.
He played two years of high school golf in Ohio and in 1999 was sixth overall in the Division II state tournament to help Kettering Archbishop Alter win the state championship. He then spent two years at the International Junior Golf Academy in Hilton Head, S.C. He finished fifth in South Carolina state championship in 2001-02.
Several factors, including the personality of Winger, the facilities at Stone Ridge and the Perry Field House, the opportunity to play for an up-and-coming program and additional funding for travel, convinced Leake to come to Bowling Green.
He played 27 rounds for the Falcons as a freshman and had the third-best average on the team with a 75.89 average. As a sophomore, he played 14 rounds, averaging 74.43.
"He does everything pretty well. Nothing goes really terribly wrong with his game," Winger said about Leake. "Consistency is his strong suit."
