Beau knows: QND junior golfer wins playoff for medalist at Quincy Invitational, guides Raiders to second-place team finish

QUINCY — Cam Appenzeller had been there before. A couple hours earlier in fact.

The Chatham Glenwood left-handed golfer pulled his tee shot on the par-4 18th at Westview Golf Course — the first hole in a three-way playoff Saturday for individual medalist of the 75th Quincy Invitational — and ended up just off the edge of the cart path to the right of the green.

It left him with a tricky chip onto a downhill sloping green, quite similar to the shot he had on No. 18 during his round of even-par 71.

“I chipped in from almost that exact same spot for eagle,” Appenzeller said. “I made that shot. So when I hit this one, I was like, ‘That’s pretty good. It’s rolling almost the exact some way.’”

The difference was Quincy Notre Dame junior Beau Eftink had used the same slope to leave himself with a birdie putt of less than 2 feet.

“He just knows the course better than me,” Appenzeller said.

Beau knows how to finish, too.

Eftink made three consecutive pars to close his round of 71, tying him with Appenzeller and Rock Island’s Chase Hadley atop the leaderboard. On the playoff hole, Eftink drove his tee shot to the left side of the fairway and hit a near-perfect chip above the hole and watched it trickle back toward the cup.

After Appenzeller missed his birdie putt, Eftink made his birdie for the individual championship.

“I did almost miss it,” Eftink said. “I pulled it, it caught the left lip and kind of went in. I got a little but lucky there, but it was nice.”

So is his reward for winning a wager with QND coach Brian Hendrian.

Eftink, coming off a second-place finish at the Class 1A state tournament last fall, missed the first week of the season while recuperating from a wrist injury that had sidelined him for roughly six weeks. As he has gotten back into the swing of things, his scores have improved.

After Eftink shot a 79 at the Peoria Notre Dame Invitational at Kellogg Golf Course, he and Hendrian made a bet — if Eftink shot even par or better in the Quincy Invitational, Hendrian owed him a Dr Pepper per day for remainder of the golf season.

When Saturday’s play ended and the awards ceremony finished, Hendrian had 60 cans of Dr Pepper awaiting Eftink.

“If I had lost, I would have had to buy him saucy nuggs at Wendy’s,” Eftink said. “But I wasn’t going to lose.”

In this case, to the victor goes the spoils, and it just happens to be his favorite drink.

“I’ve loved Dr Pepper since I was really, really young,” Eftink said. “I have never not drank Dr Pepper.”

It helped fuel quite a day for the Raiders overall. QND finished second in the team standings with a 391 total — the Quincy Invitational uses five individual scores to determine the team score, while most tournaments, including the state tournament, use four scores.

Chatham Glenwood defended its title with a 390 total, while Jacksonville was third with a 392.

“That’s pretty cool,” Appenzeller said of the repeat. “Just knowing we can win with all of these good teams in the field gives us confidence that we can do well later in the season.”

The Raiders placed four golfers in the top 20 as freshman Keeden Orpet-Hulett shot a 3-over 74, while Olliver Hendrian and Harper Hough each posted a 79. Orpet-Hulett was the low freshman in the tournament.