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Sports

Anatomy of the Lead Group: A Closer Look at Plainfield North, Central's Top Golfers

The nuances and idiosyncrasies of golf are illuminated by the lead foursome at Plainfield Central-Plainfield North dual match.

The lead foursome in a prep golf dual match always attracts the most attention.

More times than naught, the match medalist hails from the schools' top two players.

Then again, the developments that ensue over the nine-hole, weekday competition illustrates the tenuous nature of the sport.

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Monday afternoon at Whitetail Ridge Golf Club in Yorkville, the contrasting fortunes of Nick Corban and Mitch Young could not have been more pronounced in the Southwest Prairie showdown between Plainfield Central and host Plainfield North.

Corban, the No. 1 player for North, and Young, the top-rated golfer for Central, led the points standings for league MVP heading into the match.

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The first three holes were played into the teeth of capricious winds, exacerbated by the exposed nature of the par-36, front-nine layout.

Corban played the two par-4s and hazard-laden par-5 second hole in level par, recording routine two-putt  pars on the beginning stretch.

Patience was truly virtuous.

"I'm just waiting for it to happen," said Corban, who holds the district record on the course with a three-under 33.

For Young, however, the first three holes were not what he envisioned.

"I just wasn't into it," he admitted.

Young three-putted the first for bogey, failed to clear a water hazard on the second while three-putting again for the most dreaded word in competitive golf: a snowman, or in this case, a triple-bogey 8.

The Wildcats' prized sophomore then found another hazard on the third hole when he lost his drive to the right.

Suddenly, Corban held a six-shot lead on Young when the latter took double at the third.

"I let it get to me," Young said of his back-to-back three-putt greens to open the contest. "My yardages were way off (on my approaches). It was just a little bit of everything."

Corban, meanwhile, was in the red with a birdie at four, and the gulf was only widened when Young bogeyed the uphill, 149-yard hole.

The ensuing stretch played downwind, and Corban maintained his stranglehold for match leader by negating his lone bogey at No. 5 with a brilliant birdie on eight.

On the 289-yard, par-4 sixth hole, Corban had a fortuitous bounce lead to another excellent birdie opportunity.

"It's a risky decision  to pull out driver there," Corban said of the hole that illuminates the risk-reward aspect of golf. "I got pretty lucky that (my drive) stopped short of the fescue (surrounding the green)."

When the final numbers were tallied after both players missed short birdie putts at the last, Corban was nine shots clear of Young at 35-44.

The No. 2 players, meanwhile, fashioned almost identical rounds.

Plainfield North junior Caleb Kissel and Central senior Nick Dylla stood 3-over after the first three holes.

"I overcompensated for the wind a couple of times," Kissel said of his start.

"You definitely have to make putts," Dylla said of his bogey-bogey-bogey start. "Most of my bogeys were because of bad lag putts."

But the two players steadied their rounds beginning with pars at the fourth, both playing the last six holes in 1-over to finish with matching 40s.

Both players failed to make birdie despite several outstanding looks.

"New golf courses are always going to be tough," Dylla said. "Greens are probably the most important thing to learn. It doesn't help (your score) when you can't make 12-footers (for birdie)."

Kissel hit the approach shot of the day, a 195-yard, 6-iron to less than eight feet on No. 8.

"That's one you want to have at the end of the round," Kissel said of his subsequent missed conversion.

Central rallied from its first-twosome deficit to win on a fifth-card tiebreaker, illuminating the dictum that there is a reason golf duals feature eight players per side.

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