A late charge only begins to describe the play of better ball teammates Sarah Bejgrowicz and Anne Nickolaus Tuesday afternoon.

Bolted to the top of the leaderboard would be more apt, considering the two young golfers put together a string of five straight birdies to finish the second and final round. That birdie binge was good enough to overtake first-round leaders Lisa Dichter and Crystal Quinn and win the Lancaster Ladies Better Ball Championship at Pilgrim's Oak.

The Bejgrowicz-Nickolaus team, paired for the first time in a tournament, trailed by three shots after 12 holes but played the final six holes in 5-under par to win with a two-day total of 4-under 140. The duo posted a second-round best 5-under 67 for the final round.

Dichter and Quinn finished the day with an even-par 72 but couldn't hold off Bejgrowicz and Nickolaus and finished with a two-day total of 143. Dichter and Quinn slipped into a tie for second with the team of Heather Kappesser and Joyce Herr, which carded the second-best score of the second round, a four-under 68.

"We were on the driving range one day, and I asked Sarah, 'Are you playing in the Better Ball?' " Nickolaus recalled. "She said no. I asked her if she wanted to play with me, and she said, 'Yeah, let's go.' "

And go, they did. Right to the title.

"So, I went through a crash course of practicing to try and get my game back, after not having played much this summer," Nickolaus said. "We pulled it together."

Bejgrowicz, who has battled tendinitis in her left arm this summer, actually made all five birdies for her team on her ball. She was terrific from 100 yards in, leaving mostly short putts for birdies.

"Tap-ins," Quinn said.

Bejgrowicz's length off the tee put her in position to start the birdie run. On the par-5 14th hole, she was just below the green in two and made birdie with a pair of putts. Another birdie on 15 enabled the Bejgrowicz-Nickolaus team to forge a tie.

"I just let Sarah do her thing," Nickolaus said. "She's amazing."

On the par-4 16th hole, Bejgrowicz knocked a sand wedge from 75 yards to within inches and easily made birdie. On the same hole, Quinn hit the flagstick and nearly made eagle. She "settled" for birdie, but the Dichter-Quinn team could not recoup any lost ground.

"That's how you know it's not your day," Quinn said.

Bejgrowicz isn't ready to say that shots from inside 100 yards are the best part of her game. But they were Tuesday.

"It's just really solid right now," the sophomore-to-be, who plays on the women's golf team at Campbell University, said. "Whenever I practice, I make it a point to spend a lot of extra time on those shots."

The Bejgrowicz-Nickolaus team took a one-stroke lead with a birdie on 17 then pumped the lead to three with another birdie on 18. Bejgrowicz reached the par-5 green in two and slid an eagle putt just wide left. She easily made the one-foot birdie putt.

"That may have been her longest birdie putt of the last five holes," Steve Kurtz, Pilgrim's Oak's director of golf, who could be counted among the amazed at Bejgrowicz's finish, said.

"I don't know how I did it, but I just looked at the target and just swung at it," Bejgrowicz said, talking about her iron play.

Dichter and Quinn played the back nine in a respectable 1-over par but could only watch as Bejgrowicz made birdie after birdie.

"We left a lot of birdie putts on the table," Dichter, who has finished in the top two in the tournament eight times in the last 13 years (with different partners) said. "Shoulda, coulda, woulda."

E-mail: kfreeman@lnpnews.com