The final stop on the Northeastern Junior Golf Tour (NJGT) would see some very talented teenagers – and some, even younger – make their way to the Idylwylde Golf & Country Club for rounds on Saturday and Sunday, as both event and tour champions were crowned.

Competing on his home course, Thaddeus Quesnele not only edged out Loucas Couture for the U13 boys tour honours, but also blitzed his way to weekend bragging rights, recording highly consistent rounds of 87 and 88 in hot, muggy conditions.

“My putting was great,” noted the young man who celebrated his 13th birthday on Saturday in style. “I got up and down a lot, which was good. I tried to keep calm, which is really hard. If you make a bad shot, you want to be mad – but you really can’t because the rest of your round will not go good.”

The putting, in particular, was a wonderful payoff for the young man who has been playing golf for some time now but really began to take it more seriously last year, spending two hours or so a day (in the summer) working on his game – with special emphasis to his play on the greens.

“I’ve improved a lot at getting the right pace and the right line,” said Quesnele, acknowledging that if you can learn to putt well at the Idylwylde, you can putt well on many a challenging course. “You have to read the greens and not blow by the hole.”

“The greens are really fast here and the pin placements are sometimes really hard, like today.”

Things were a little more divided in some of the other age brackets as Noah Thorpe (tour champion) and Ayrton Longe (Idylwylde champion) split bragging rights in the U19 boys bracket, while Carter Baron (tour) and Ronan Grant (Idy) did likewise at U17.

Preparing for her freshman season at Western Michigan this fall, Lea Lemieux swept both U19 girls titles while Patrick Wing matched that in the U10 boys division. The U15 boys bracket would also feature shared accolades as Cole Oulahen (tour) and Rory Bardswich (Idy) both earned their moments of fame.

And for as much as he may not have enjoyed the weekend in Sudbury that he would have liked, a huge shoutout nonetheless to Camden Poirier, who finished 12th in a field of the 60 best U15 golfers in the province last week. The young Idylwylde golfer posted rounds of 75 & 77 at the South Muskoka Curling & Golf Club in Bracebridge, host to the Ontario Championships.

Following are the top finishers on the NJGT this year:

U19 Division - Boys
1st - Noah Thorpe - 372.5
2nd - Ayrton Longe - 340
3rd - Ryan Di Salle - 302.5

U19 Division - Girls
1st - Lea Lemieux - 400
2nd - Elliott Boyles - 335
3rd - Amy Smith - 315

U17 Division - Boys
1st - Carter Baron - 380
2nd - Camden Poirier - 355
3rd - Ronan Grant - 292.5

U15 Division - Boys
1st - Cole Oulahen - 360
2nd - Alex Legge - 335
3rd - Owen Strom - 302.5

U13 Division - Boys
1st - Thaddeus Quesnele - 380
2nd - Loucas Couture - 355
3rd - Henry Mullen - 285

U10 Division - Boys
1st - Patrick Wing - 380
2nd - Finnley Beaudette - 355
3rd - Xavier Wing - 315