Contra Costa CC 2025

By all accounts, our season-ending Jimmy Naylor/Bruce Cornelius Memorial Tournament at Contra Costa C.C. was a rousing success. After a rainout two weeks ago, the weather gods cooperated with a cool and partly cloudy day. Even after 2 inches of rain, the course was in very good condition, although winter rules on the fairway and in the unmowed rough were welcomed. You may brag to your friends on the East Coast how amazing conditions here are in mid-November! Pace of play was good—thank you all.

Competitions on the course were exciting. Mat Yamagata’s victory in the gross competition with a 77 was not headline news, but other competitions were hotly contested. Geoff Cohen shot a “career round,” a net 67, to win the enormous Naylor/Cornelius perpetual trophy. Geoff’s stellar round also affected the outcome of the season-long Bridgett Trophy points competition. Coming in, defending champion Mat Yamagata held a slim ten point lead over Eric Ingraham, 635-625. Eric was coming off a narrow defeat on the 18th hole in the finals of the Match Play tournament at Pasatiempo. A victory there would have yielded another 150 points and a commanding lead. At CCCC, assuming that Mat was going to win low gross for 200 points (a reasonable assumption), Eric calculated that he needed to win Low Net AND a closie (for 220 points) to win the Bridgett Trophy by 10 points. Eric did his part, shooting an excellent Gross 80/Net 70 and capturing one of the closest to hole competitions. However, Geoff’s career round pushed Eric to second place (both net and gross), costing him 100 points and the Bridgett victory. The final results were: Mat-835 points, Eric-745 points. Mat has now won eight Players of the Year since he joined LJGA in 2013. He might consider building a permanent display case for the Bridgett Trophy.

 Other results:

Gross:

  • Mat Yamagata-77

  • Eric Ingraham-80

  • Darren Rashkin-85

Net:

  • Geoff Cohen-67

  • Michael Berg-73 (in a cardoff)

  • Jonathan Nightingale-73

Closest to Hole:

  • 2nd hole-Ingraham 17’5”

  • 5th-Berg 3’10”

  • 8th-Co-President Thomas Brooks 5’0” (215 yards over a yawning bunker)

  • 12th-Cohen 15’11”

  • 14th- Darren Rashkin 12-4”.

Treasurer and Host, Peter Mankin, MC’d the awards ceremony. Peter gave a brief history of the LJGA going back 100 years and a few words about Jimmy Naylor, S.F. patent lawyer and jokester in the 1930’s, and good friend and longtime Board member, Bruce Cornelius, who sadly passed away four years ago. Darren Rashkin was awarded the “avant garde” Match Play trophy. Winners of the special Skins Game competition were Geoff Cohen, Eric Ingraham and Darren Rashkin, pocketing $80 each to pad their previous winnings of the evening. Thomas Brooks and Match Play Chair, Josh Brownstein, reviewed a season that has been one of the most successful in recent memory.

The Prime Rib and Salmon dinner was given rave reviews, capping the end of a very enjoyable day and evening.

Kevin ColemanGreen Hills Country Club