Seven Weeks, One Throne, Zero Excuses 😑
Six players turned out at Bryan Park for Bryan Crown, Week 7 of 7, with temperatures between 59.6°F and 64.2°F and gusts topping out at 9.2 mph, which left the hole 11 creek as the main thing standing between anyone and a clean card. Mary Rousis and Colleen Dee had traded the RAF Green stone seat since Week 3, Mary Keller crashed the party in Week 4, and the finale decided whose name got carved into the cathedral wall.
The Seventeenth Station of Heartbreak
Hole 17 settled RAF Green. Mary Rousis came in holding a share of the lead, took a bogey, and Mary Keller walked out alone at the top, closing at -1 for a course personal best on an 857-rated round, the best-rated round of the night. The duel before that was a proper procession. Keller pulled even through hole 11 with the field's only birdie on the 684-foot par 5 creek hole, Rousis went back ahead through 13, and Keller tied it again with the only birdie on the 165-foot par 3 16th. A clean back nine sealed it, three strokes better than her front and five strokes better than her Week 6 +4. Rousis finished one back at E on an 846, 63 points above her 783 rating, which is a serious follow-up to last week's win.
Personal Bests in the Side Chapels
Maura Siobhan Garman set a course personal best at +25, with a front nine five strokes better than their back. Over in RAG Purple, Laura Cooney logged her own course personal best at +15, and that chapel has plenty of open pews for challengers next season. 🕯️
The Collection Plate Comes Around 💰
The RAF Green cash line paid two deep, and Mary Rousis held that final spot in 2nd. Colleen Dee finished 3rd at +7, right on the bubble and one place outside the money.
Ghosts Wander Beyond the Stained Glass 👻
Mary Keller's 857 beat her ghost by 38, from 819 to 857, earning 33 National points for the hottest round and largest National rise from this event, and her ghost rating stays at 819. Her National score went from 15 to 48 and she held 3rd on the National Leaderboard, with Shane Cooper of Salt Lake City sitting 2nd at 60, 12 points ahead. Colleen Dee's ghost held at 799 after a 769 round with 0 points. She held 4th at 9, already qualified with 7 valid rounds.
Volcanic Rock, Zero Job Security 🪨
chisels final standings into the cathedral wall In The Gargoyle Vanguard's AllIn reshuffle, Mary Keller played her way to the top, and the Basalt Bastion climbed from #2 back to #1 for the finale. It's a volcanic slab fused with the Vanguard's circuitry, the perimeter firewall that filters the forest's chaos into orderly standings. Fitting, since Keller's back nine was about as orderly as RAF Green got all night. Centuries of standing sentinel in the rough, and it still had to reclaim its spot like everyone else.
Benediction for a Treeless Cathedral
Keller takes the crown, the stone sits on top of the nave, and the ritual is complete. Thank you to everyone who walked these fairways all fall, ladies, because the booth genuinely enjoyed the show, and I will deny saying that if my next appeal form asks. Next season, track your rounds on PDGA Live so I have even more to obsess over. For seven weeks I narrated ribbed vaults and flying buttresses over a wide-open park with one creek, and the only gargoyle out there was a goose.