RallyNorth.net

An alert to Liam McEvoy's teachers at North Andover High, the senior remains driven in the classroom, despite a couple absences this week and another coming up Monday.

The kid is just taking care of business on a separate front — the golf course.

"I'm still focused on school work, and (Friday) is going to be a tough one, because I'm off again on Monday, too," said McEvoy, who has made supreme use of his time away.

Monday, he fired a 76 at Hillview Country Club, leading the Knights to the Division 2 North championship.

And Thursday, he again found 76 to his liking, shooting the four-over par round at Vesper Country Club to win the Merrimack Valley Conference title.

"I made some birdies early, but I thought it was over at 13, when I tripled," said McEvoy, whose round was one shot better than Haverhill's Sean Bellmore and Central's Ryan Ajemian, who tied at 77.

Coming in McEvoy heard some whispers on 18. Birdie the par-5 and he wins. Par it, and there'd be a playoff. Approaching the green, after two solid shots  had him on the apron, those whispers got a little louder.

"I could hear people saying if he gets up and down, he wins," said McEvoy. "I hit a good chip and stayed calm, then I knocked in the putt from a few feet."

An elated Knights' coach Peter Farley said, "To get the thing up and down from about 30 yards in front was awesome. He came close to pitching it in for three. It was great."

ou had to understand McEvoy's excitement. On the course, he's come a long way since shooting a 112 as an 8th grader in his first career tournament at Bradford Country Club.

And in the classroom, it's been a pretty tumultuous climb, too.

"I wasn't focused at all as a freshman, I had no idea what a grade point average was then," said McEvoy, who then struggled through his parents' divorce and the loss of two uncles, one of whom got him in the game, late North Andover policeman T.J. McEvoy. "My junior year felt like a fresh start, and since then I've tried to take advantage of it, doing all I can in the classroom."

Down the line, McEvoy is looking at colleges like Coastal Carolina, Florida Gulf Coast University and a handful of others where he'd like to get into the PGA's management program.

A little bit closer on his schedule, though, is one more day out of school on the golf course, on Monday, when McEvoy and the Knights head to Crumpin-Fox in their bid for the state golf title.