Steady play key for Kinney all week

The 29th IGA Match Play and 6th IGA Women’s Match Play Championship began on Monday, June 26, at The Harvester Golf Club, Rhodes. All players played an 18-hole qualifying round on Monday morning to determine seeding into match play.

On the Men’s side, Gene Elliott was medalist of the qualifying round with 66 (-6) and earned the #1 seed into match play on Tuesday morning. J.D. Anderson, playing along side Elliott on Monday, earned the #2 seed with a 67 (-5) of his own.

A total of 16 men will teed it up this morning (Wednesday) and those surviving into quarterfinal matches this afternoon are Jon Olson/Josh Black, Tripp Kinney/Sam Zoske, Charles Jahn/Jon Brown and Conner Koberg/Aaron Stevens.

Semifinals, which were played Thursday morning, saw Tripp Kinney (pictured above) come out on top against Josh Black (5&4). In the other semifinal, Conner Koberg outlasted Jon Brown (1 up). Both Kinney and Koberg, who squared off in the finals, play golf for Iowa State University. Black and Brown have long since exhausted their eligibility.

In the final match, Kinney used a quick start to race to a 3 up lead after only five holes. He made the turn 4 up and never looked back, cruising to a 6&5 victory over his good fiend and teammate.

“My goal this week to just stay steady through all my matches,” Kinney said. “I just wanted to make a ton of pars. I did a really good job sticking to my game plan. It’s a tough golf course and it got windy.”

Click here for complete brackets and starting times for the 29th IGA Match Play.