By Brendan Connarton

Contributing Writer

The Oneonta Country Club is still feeling the effects from flooding earlier this summer, but that won’t stop the Otsego County Amateur Championship from taking place this weekend.

The OCC will host the first round of the two-day tournament on Saturday before the event concludes Sunday at the Leatherstocking Golf Course in Cooperstown.

"With the flooding, there were holes that were affected and there are bare areas on some fairways," OCC club pro Jeremy Kerr said. "We just got a new valve put in two weeks ago to put water on the fairways, and just by getting water to th[an error occurred while processing this directive]e fairways, you can see the difference from last week with the amount of grass that has grown."

Last year’s champion, 21-year-old Matt Schulte, followed a first-round 72 at the OCC with a 75 at Leatherstocking for his first Atchinson Cup win. Schulte beat runner-up Dallas Pylinski, a former SUNY Delhi and Edmeston Central golfer, by three strokes.

"It was the first big tournament I have ever won, so it took a little while to sink in that I actually won a tournament," said Schulte who went on to win the Oswego and Hartwick invitationals last year as a sophomore at SUNY Delhi. "It’s like getting over a hump in winning your first tournament, so now I look back on what I have to do to get back there and I tell myself I can do it again."

Success seems to run in the Schulte family, too.

Alan Schulte, Matt’s uncle and the head golf pro at Hawthorns Golf Course in Fishers, Ind., finished second in a playoff at the PGA Professional National Championship at Turning Stone on June 25. That led to his second appearance in the PGA Championship on Thursday and Friday. Alan Schulte, who also won the Indiana Open on July 13, missed the cut at the PGA.

Mike Schulte, who also is Matt’s uncle, won the OCC Club Championship last weekend.

"It feels good to be a part of a family of good golfers," Matt Schulte said. "At the same time, I don’t want to make it so there is a name I have to live up to. Alan was a much better player at my age than I am, so I don’t think I could play at the same level that he did. But I try."

Mike Schulte will be one of 25 players looking to take the title away from the younger Schulte this weekend. Others include five-time champion Steve Torrey, 2004 winner Bruce Miller and Pylinski.

"There is a little pressure because I am defending the title," Matt Schulte said. "I just have to do what I have to do to play against par, and that’s all I can worry about."