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Pastore, who plays out of Griffith Harris in Greenwich won the Jerry Courville Sr. Player of the Year Award.
Pastore’s career year was highlighted by two down-the-stretch victories at the MGA Ike and Met Amateur championships, but steady play in the Met Area also played a big role in Pastore’s runaway Player of the Year season.
Heading into the Ike he was battling for position in the Player of the Year standings with players like Joe Saladino, Dylan Newman, Matthew Lowe, and Xander McDonald-Smith. Winning the 54-hole event at Montclair sprung him to the top of the standings and he never looked back. Pastore, 22,will receive the award at the MGA’s 117th Annual Meeting and Dinner on Wednesday, Dec. 3 at Westchester Country Club.
The MGA Jerry Courville Sr. Player of the Year Award is presented annually to the Met Area amateur who compiles the best record in select events during the course of the year, and is based on a system in which players earn points for their finishes in designated local, national and international championships.
The 2014 University of Virginia graduate hadn’t won an MGA event since his junior days of dominance, when he captured the 2006 and 2009 Met Juniors, as well as the 2010 Carter Cup.
“I never stopped believing I could compete with those guys,” Pastore said. “I’d done it before in the past and I was just as good as them at one point, it took a lot of self-belief.”
Pastore won the Met Amateur with a hole-in-one on the 35th hole. He also had an outstanding individual week at the USGA Men’s State Team Championship in French Lick, Indiana. Pastore led Team Connecticut in the 54-hole competition to an eighth place finish. In an individual field of 154 Pastore placed in second, missing out on a medalist honors by just one stroke.
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