May 18, 2006

By PETE IORIZZO, Staff writer Albany Times Union First published: Thursday, May 18, 2006

LOUDONVILLE -- Robby and Bryan Bigley learned their way around a golf course by following their father, a superintendent at Pinehaven Country Club, to work every day. They woke up at 5 a.m. to mow lawns, rake sand and move holes.

"I've done it my whole life," Robby said. "I don't even know what normal kids do during the summer."

Here's one thing normal kids don't do: play side-by-side with a sibling in the NCAA men's golf championship.

Robby, Bryan and the rest of the Siena men's golf team tee off this morning at Sand Ridge Golf Club in Cleveland. In the Saints' first trip to the NCAA Tournament, they will compete against 27 other schools, the top 10 of which advance to the finals in Sunriver, Ore., beginning May 31.

Robby, a senior, and Bryan, a junior, figure to lead the six-player Siena contingent, which includes Capital Region players Dennis Gosier (Gansevoort) and alternate Chris Haggerty (Queensbury).

Bryan and Robby, who grew up in Rotterdam, played together for five years on the Schalmont High team, but, before the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Tournament April 30, they'd never shared a championship.

"To win it with Robby on the team is pretty special," said Bryan, who this past Monday advanced to the sectional qualifying round of the U.S. Open for the second time.

Bryan and Robby guess they first picked up golf clubs around age 4 or 5. At work with their father, they escaped maintenance work to take a few swings near the tee boxes.

On days when they couldn't tag along to work, they waited in the driveway, golf clubs in tow, for their father to return. They always sneaked in nine holes before sunset, topped off by a visit to the Corner Ice Cream Store in Guilderland.

"On a hot summer night we'd talk over a milkshake," said their father, Rob. "My biggest fear was the day I'd come home from work and they wouldn't be there waiting for me in the driveway. But it never happened. When they got into high school, they just got into it more."

At Schalmont, Robby became a four-time Colonial Council MVP and three-time state championship qualifier, a feat matched by his brother. Neither has missed a tournament at Siena. Bryan holds the MAAC Championship record with a score of 6 under par, which he recorded in 2005.

Before Siena won the MAAC title, it finished second three consecutive years -- Robby's freshman, sophomore and junior seasons. Robby gathered the team before this year's tournament and said, "Enough with second."

"It's tough knowing you're that close to the NCAA Tournament every year," Robby said.

Siena coach Tom Wronowski said on the plane to Cleveland he sat next to Robby and told him, "I'm really glad we got to the NCAAs before you move on."

"He deserves it, as does Bryan," Wronowski said. "On the course, their ability to focus and ability to start with a bad hole and come back and grind it out for the next eight is great. It's something that's been instilled in the rest of the team."

It was instilled in Robby and Bryan a long time ago, on the putting green they constructed on the side of their house and on the Pinehaven fairways.

"I remember spending the entire day at the golf course," Robby said. "We still do it. We'd work from 6 (a.m.) to noon, then go to the golf course. It was part of growing up and part of our family."