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By Dave Lagarde
PGA TOUR Correspondent

He had been there. He had walked up the sidewalk and the steps. And he had rung the bell and knocked on the door to the Nationwide Tour throne room, three times in 2007 to be exact.

But on each occasion, Justin Bolli shuffled his feet, twiddled his thumbs and waited patiently for a response that never came.

Until Sunday's final round of the Northeast Pennsylvania Classic, that is. This time the resounding response to his knock on the door was his -- a pair of timely birdies on the 16th and 18th holes that sandwiched leader Richard Johnson's watery double bogey on the 17th. The combination of his clutch play and Johnson's misfortune netted Bolli a precious one-stroke victory.

"I never got a chance to speak to Richard, but I know how he must feel because I've been in that situation,'' said Bolli, who bogeyed the 72nd hole of the 2007 Fort Smith Classic presented by Stephens Inc. to allow champion Jay Williamson to escape a playoff. "He had to feel like the tournament was his; that he gave it away.''

The win, the second of Bolli's Nationwide Tour career, had meaning well beyond the winner's crystal hardware and the $90,000 first-place check. Bolli, who moved to sixth place on the money list, does not have to play in another event this season should he choose to take off the rest of the year. With $249,484 in official earnings, he is a lock to finish among "The 25'' and graduate for the second time to the PGA TOUR for his second tour of duty.

"It's really nice to have that out of the way,'' Bolli said late Sunday while still floating on victory Cloud nine. "I really wanted to get that over with.''

Not that Bolli, 31, has any pressing matters on his plate or vacations in faraway places with strange sounding names in mind. Time off can wait will Bolli sets his sights on moving on up the money ladder.

The way he sees it, being No. 6 on the money list with 10 events remaining gives him a warm and fuzzy feeling of accomplishment, he can only imagine the tingling sensation he'd improve five spots and claim No. 1 following the Nationwide Tour Championship the first week of November.

"That's certainly something to shoot at,'' said Bolli, who will play in nine of the last 10 events. "I learned the last time the higher up you finish on the money list the better off you are.''

The last time was the 2004 season when Bolli, a former walk-on at the University of Georgia, corralled eight top-10 finishes including a victory in the Chattanooga Classic on the way to a ninth-place finish on the money list. He practically floated onto golf's biggest stage in 2005 with expectations that might have been, well, a mite too lofty.

"Actually the expectations were pretty unrealistic,'' Bolli said, laughing. "I thought I would win at least one tournament and qualify for the Tour Championship.''

That bubble quickly burst on the West Coast Swing when Bolli basically bombed out. He made one cut in six starts, earning $11,607 for a tie for 60th in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. As a result he got lost in the first re-shuffle and basically never recovered. Three top 25s and a paltry $204,000 in earnings were about all he had to show in 24 starts.

"There was so much to get used to,'' he said. "There's the hoopla. You're playing with guys you watched on TV. I started poorly. I got frustrated and mad. You can't play good golf that way. It was a rookie mistake.''

That is one Bolli is bound and determined not to repeat the second time around in 2008.

"My expectations will be a lot lower this time around,'' he said. "I'll keep my head down and play golf.''

Bolli, a self-described late bloomer, has made that a habit, save for his hiccup in 2005. He said he got serious about golf when he was a senior in high school and then had the courage to walk-on at Georgia, an SEC and national powerhouse. He didn't make a dent during his freshmen season, but kept working hard on his game and showed dramatic improvement, enough to make the traveling squad in 1995-1997.

"That taught me the value of hard work,'' he said. "It was a very rewarding experience.''

Bolli played four seasons on the Hooters Tour with consistent success and then made that big splash on the Nationwide Tour as a rookie. He was humbled the following year and didn't play very consistently on the Nationwide Tour in 2006. He was positioned to make a run at his PGA TOUR card, but made only four cuts in his last 10 full-field events, making a little more than $13,000 to fall into the also-ran category.

But again, Bolli worked hard on game improvement, using a trial-and-error process until he got it right.

"I was shutting the club face at the top,'' he said. "That was pretty much me.''

He admitted to "trying a bunch of stuff'' before stumbling onto the solution. He weakened his grip, particularly with the right hand. That came in April and although he has missed four cuts and been disqualified once in 12 events, he has used the victory, a pair of ties for second and a solo third to make a dramatic climb on the money list. And now he's ready for another shot at grabbing the brass ring in 2008, this time as a better and more experienced play.

"I wasn't quite ready for the PGA TOUR the last time, but I'm excited to get back to that level,'' he said. That's why we are all out here.''