Georgia Tech football coach Paul Johnson and former Tech basketball star Jon Barry won the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl Challenge, a charity golf tournament, yet again Wednesday. Johnson and Barry bested a field of13 football coaches and their celebrity playing partners for a fourth time, winning $100,000 to be given to charity and the Tech scholarship fund. Johnson and Barry won for the second year in a row and fourth time in the past five years.
The Johnson/Barry team won at Reynolds Plantation in a four-team playoff, eliminating N.C. State (Dave Doeren and Terry Harvey), South Carolina (Steve Spurrier and Sterling Sharpe) and finally Alabama (Nick Saban, Mark Ingram) on the fourth sudden-death hole.
The playoff followed after each team finished 18 holes at 9-under-par (scramble format). Johnson and Barry eagled on 17 and birdied 18 to get to 9-under to get into the playoff.
“Well, I rode Jon pretty hard today, but in the end, we were able to grind it out,” Johnson said in the news release. “I didn’t think we had much of a chance after the front nine, but Jon hit some really good shots and we found a way.”
Johnson and Barry have earned $682,500 in winnings at the event.
It was evidence again of Johnson's legendary competitive streak and his considerable golf game. He said in 2013 that he is a 7-handicap, though he plays little or not at all from August through April and then about twice a week May through July. Growing up in Newland, N.C., he learned the game through caddying.
