Move over Jack.

Fitzpatrick’s historic breakthrough at the highest level—achieved while staying with the same family and sleeping in the same room he did back in August 2013—is hardly the biggest surprise, of course. Just last month, only a poorly played final round of the PGA Championship at Southern Hills prevented the 27-year from pre-empting this, the biggest win of his professional career. He has, however, always been a man on the rise. British Boys champion in 2012, he picked up the silver medal as low amateur at the 2013 Open Championship before moving smoothly on to that Country Club win that saw him ranked the world’s No. 1 amateur.

Not for nothing does Fitzpatrick’s swing coach, Mike Walker, variously describe his charge as a “baby-faced assassin,” “ruthless,” “one-track minded,” “hell-bent on getting to the very top” and possessed of “an innate confidence, that is hard to see. It is within him.”

Fitzpatrick celebrates making a long putt for birdie on the 13th green during the final round of the 122nd U.S. Open. Jared C. Tilton

All of the above were on display over the course of a pulsating final round in which the lead was passed between Scheffler, the Masters champion and World No. 1, and Zalatoris, who now has three runner-up finishes in majors at age 25.

As ever, there were key moments during Fitzpatrick’s closing two-under 68, none more so than the 50-foot birdie putt the seven-time winner on the DP World Tour rolled in across the 13th green. But the 19-footer that disappeared into the cup two holes later for what turned out to be the decisive birdie is surely a close second.

“The feeling is out of this world,” was Fitzpatrick’s instant reaction to claiming the first of what he hopes will be at least six major titles.

“Six is the number,” he says. “That’s the number that we all agreed on. I’ve got a bit of a way to go, but this is a good start. It is so cliché, but it’s stuff you dream of as a kid. I can retire a happy man tomorrow. The expectations were for me to play well. Having won the U.S. Amateur, I just felt so comfortable around this place. I know where to hit it; I know where to miss it. Because of my success here before, it felt like this was the time. I’m just happy to be unbeaten around this place.”

Nine years earlier, Fitzpatrick claimed another USGA title by winning the U.S. Amateur at The Country Club. Boston Globe

The holing of putts has always been a strength of the Fitzpatrick game, alongside his metronomic ability to find fairways from the tee. But the knock on him—a reason perhaps why he had yet to win as a professional in the U.S.—was always that he lacked the length to compete at the elite level. Well, forget that. As a result of his work with bio-mechanist Sasho Mackenzie and a Speedstick called “The Stack,” Fitzpatrick is now much longer off the tee. Among the contending group, he was the only man who found the green with his drive at the 310-yard fifth hole, a feat he followed up by flying his second shot at the 557-yard par-5 eighth onto the distant putting surface.

All of which came as no surprise to Walker, who followed the final round by phone while driving north up the M6 motorway from Heathrow Airport. The pair have done much work so far this year, making changes that mean fresh analysis of the Fitzpatrick technique is required. Gone is the short-hitting but accurate short-game specialist, replaced by the owner of a strong all-round game.

“The main thing has been Matt’s change to [cross]-handed chipping,” Walker said. “He’d been doing it in practice as a drill. Then we discovered that he was better out of rough that way, so he started chipping from rough with left-hand below right. But it became obvious that his chipping from short grass wasn’t as good a people thought it was.

“Anyway, we met at the Bear’s Club in Florida and studied the full list of notes we had on his chipping,” Walker continued. “I laid it all out to him. And his reaction was to say he didn’t have to think about his cross-handed action. So it was obvious what we should do. But before we came to a final decision, in typical Matt-fashion he collected a month’s worth of data comparing the two actions. And the rest is history.”

Fitzpatrick wasn’t the only one to become a new major champion on Sunday, as veteran caddie Billy Foster also grabbed his first win in one of golf’s biggest events. Patrick Smith

Other than that, the pair worked on taking a lot of “set” out of Fitzpatrick’s left wrist, a move that has revolutionized his iron play. His driving meanwhile has retained its consistency and accuracy, even as he has gained yardage through the speed work he has done.

“It has made him a world player and he just proved it,” says Walker. “With Matt’s game is it almost like spinning plates. Last year he played OK, driving it great and putting really well. But his iron play wasn’t very good. Nor was his chipping. This year he’s been a bit more streaky with this putter. He’s had bad weeks and good weeks. But his approach play and chipping are now on a level with the rest of his game. He’s strong through the bag now, after plugging the two gaps in his game.”

Still, another factor in Fitzpatrick’s success is caddie Billy Foster, yet another Yorkshireman. Like his boss, this was Foster’s first major championship victory after a string of near things alongside the likes of Seve Ballesteros, Lee Westwood and Darren Clarke. But his biggest disappointment came alongside Thomas Bjorn in the 2003 Open at Royal St. George’s. Three shots clear with three holes to play, the Dane needed three attempts to escape a greenside bunker at the 16th and contrived to lose by a shot to Ben Curtis.

“It was heartbreaking to lose that day,” Foster says. “I cried in the car on the way home.”

The only tears this time, of course, will be those of joy.

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The post U.S. Open 2022: Matt Fitzpatrick became a major champion by turning his shortcomings into strengths appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Tod Leonard
If those who lead the USGA needed any reminding about why they have returned to the Pebble Beach Golf Links with their championships so frequently over the past 93 years, they only needed to look out the window on Wednesday for their big announcement on the seaside grounds. Before they were bright blue skies with wispy white clouds and the sun shimmering off Stillwater Cove beyond the most famous finishing hole in golf. On its finest days, Pebble Beach is heaven on Earth, and the USGA knows it has a great thing going there. “Arguably, the greatest walk in golf,” mused John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s chief championships officer.

There are USGA championship sites that fall in and out of favour, become obsolete or lose their lustre. Pebble Beach never has and seemingly never will, and now it has the largest commitment yet from the organisation that seems to cherish it the most.

At a news conference, the USGA announced its single-largest package of championships yet for Pebble. Beyond the already slated 2023 U.S. Women’s Open and 2027 U.S. Open, six more events were added to the calendar that will take Pebble Beach’s association with national championships into the 2040s.

The U.S. Opens are scheduled for 2032, 2037 and 2044. The U.S. Women’s Opens will be played in 2035, 2040 and 2048. The latter of those championships will be played nearly 120 years after the U.S. Amateur, the first USGA event at Pebble, was contested in 1929.

“John [Bodenhamer] has promised that I can be a marshal on the 18th hole in 2044, so I’m pretty excited about that,” joked David Stivers, CEO of the Pebble Beach Company.

Pebble Beach is one of the USGA’s most iconic venues, having hosted 13 championships, including six U.S. Opens. Some past champions are among the game’s greatest: Jack Nickalus in 1972, Tom Watson in ’82 and Tiger Woods in 2000. In 2019, Gary Woodland joined the winners’ group that includes Tom Kite and Graeme McDowell with a three-stroke victory over Brooks Koepka.

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The post USGA announces Pebble Beach as next ‘anchor’ site, awards iconic course six more championships appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington
OAKMONT, Pa. — It’s hard to describe the expression on James Piot’s face when he held the Havemeyer Trophy for the first time behind Oakmont Country Club’s 17th green late Sunday afternoon. Let’s call it something between shock, exhilaration and awe, as the newly minted U.S. Amateur champion, after a 2-and-1 win over Austin Greaser in the 36-hole championship finale, stared for a few moments at the most impressive piece of golf hardware he’d ever laid his hands on.

“I was just trying to see if it was real or not,” Piot said when asked what was running through his mind as he gave the trophy that first long look.

It was definitely real, the hard-earned result of years of trying to prove people wrong. Yes, you can come from up Canton, Mich., with its eight-month golf season, and still be a damn good player. And you can be 5-foot-9 and 153 pounds and still stand tall.

In all likelihood you’d probably never heard of Piot before catching a glimpse of him this week at the 121st edition of the USGA’s oldest championship. The 22-year-old fifth-year senior at Michigan State was ranked No. 86 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking, good but not elite. He wasn’t a member of the U.S. Walker Cup team last May at Seminole Golf Club. He qualified for the U.S. Am last year at Bandon Dunes, even earned the No. 2 seed, but didn’t get past the second round of match play.

It’s easy, then, to believe that some unknown wound up walking off with the most prestigious title in amateur golf. And, maybe, technically, you’d be right. But don’t mistake unknown for fluky or undeserving.

“I know what people think, by the way he looks and all. He doesn’t look dynamic or powerful,” said Michigan State men’s coach Casey Lubahn. “But you can’t see his heart.”

It’s the heart that showed on the back nine at Oakmont, when it looked almost certain that Piot had finally met his match in Greaser, a 20-year-old honorable mention All-American at North Carolina. Through 27 holes, Piot shot the equivalent of six over par—four over on the front nine of the afternoon 18 alone—leaving him 3 down with nine holes to play. That’s when he turned to his caddie, Spartans assistant coach Dan Ellis, and uttered his latest audacious prediction: said he was going to shoot four under on the back nine.

And what exactly made him think that he could do that?

“Just self-belief. I feel like that’s one of the things, the golfer I am, I’m that guy who never has an extremely bad round,” Piot said. “In my head on the day, I’m kind of doing a recap and I think I was like six over. I’m like, ‘That’s not me.’ ”

And then it happened. A perfect drive on the par-4 10th, setting up a 9-iron approach from 150 yards and his first birdie of the afternoon session. 2 down.

Another good drive on the par-4 11th, and by good meaning it was safely in the 10th fairway, setting up a par that helped him win the hole when Greaser three-putted. 1 down.

Another par, this time on the 603-yard 12th hole, tied up the match, as Greaser suddenly was struggling to find fairways he’d hit all week and having trouble adjusting to Oakmont’s greens, which were getting faster as the day went on.

When Greaser bogeyed the par-3 13th hole, Piot’s 14-foot birdie try now conceded, Piot had his first lead since standing 1 up after the morning 18.

They exchanged birdies on the 14th hole, but Piot got to 2 up when he won the par-4 15th with another par. Two holes later, he was staring at the Havemeyer.

“I just didn’t execute coming down the stretch,” Greaser said. “I think it’s pretty obvious. He won four holes in a row there and kind of tides changed, and that’s how it goes.”

Chris Keane
Austin Greaser had a 3-up lead with nine holes to play, but struggled to find fairways on the back nine.

Piot’s golf career began at a place unlikely to produce a future U.S. Amateur champion: Fox Hills Golf and Banquet Centre in Plymouth, Mich. The facility had three courses and became Piot’s Disneyland each summer, the place he’d go to hang with his brother and his buddies, gamble for just about anything on the putting greens, and learn how to play golf rather than just golf swing.

While he developed a reputation as a stick within the state, winning the Michigan Junior Am and three high school state titles, it didn’t carry much outside the Wolverine State. So it was that Piot ended up staying home, following in his older brother’s footsteps and playing at MSU for Lubahn.

Since the fall of 2017, Piot has worked methodically on his game in relative anonymity with his Spartan teammates, a very real chip on his shoulder.

“Good golfers have long memories,” Lubahn joked.

Piot had quick results in college and was Big Ten freshman of the year in 2018. He took his biggest leap in the 2020-21 season, earning honourable mention All-American honours with a win and six more top-10s in the spring, including at Big Tens and NCAA Regionals.

“It’s hard to identify any one thing because it’s just gradual improvement,” says Lubahn when asked about what’s the biggest difference in Piot’s game from when he first arrived in East Lansing. “He’s picking up a 10th of a shot every day. And he’s the best driver I’ve ever coached.”

And not a bad putter either. In preparation for the U.S. Amateur, Piot put back into his bag a Ping Piper H putter, a flat stick he’d fallen in and out of love with since the sixth grade, one he affectionately nicknamed “the garbage putter.”

“My dad got that from a golf shop actually just down the road from our house, had to be 10 years ago,” Piot said. “He used it for like two weeks and was like, ‘This thing is not worth it.’ I think he got it for $60 or $70 at the time. I picked it up in probably sixth or seventh grade and started rolling with it. I was like, ‘This thing is actually awesome.’ ”

The putter proved vital this week at Oakmont, Piot holing several clutch putts.

Chris Keane
James Piot celebrates with his caddie/assistant coach Dan Ellis after winning the 2021 U.S. Amateur.

In the glow of victory, Piot could be allowed the chance to gloat. What did this win say about him and where he came from?

“Just it’s kind of nice to show the guys out there that don’t go to the big-time school that you can still do it,” he said. “Coming from Michigan it’s a phenomenal feeling being able to grind from a guy who wasn’t highly sought after to U.S. Am champ.”

It also proved something else: just how deep the amateur game is. All over the country, there are players like Piot, grinding day in and day out, aspiring for greatness with no guarantee that their efforts will be rewarded. Only the hope that the week will come when they get their chance to prove their mettle.

That week happened to be this one for the little man from Canton, the week James Piot finally became somebody you’d heard of.

The post James Piot’s comeback U.S. Amateur win is for all the little guys no one believed in appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington
OAKMONT, Pa. — The question washed over Mark Goetz as he stood on the terrace outside Oakmont Country Club late Wednesday morning, a handful of reporters interviewing the newly minted medalist at the 121st U.S. Amateur Championship as darkening skies swirled in the distance.

“What’s the biggest tournament you’ve ever won?”

The 23-year-old senior-to-be at West Virginia University paused a few beats, his wrinkled eyebrows an outward sign of the gears grinding inside his head. The effort wasn’t because Goetz has an abundance of victories to choose from. On the bio sheet he filled out for the USGA, under playing record, he lists just three “firsts”: the Western Pennsylvania Amateur in 2019, the WPGA Open in 2020 and the Mountaineer Invitational in 2021.
A handful of reasons to root for Goetz this week as he moves on to match play in the USGA’s oldest championship (Mother Nature willing). He lives 40 minutes from Oakmont in Greensburg, Pa., so locals will appreciate the son of the Keystone State representing (expect a flood of folks from Hannastown Golf Club, which had four players qualify for the U.S. Amateur this year, to be onsite and cheering him on). When nightfall interrupted his second round of stroke play on Tuesday, he didn’t hesitate to pull out of Oakmont’s parking lot and pull into a McDonalds a few miles away for a quick dinner. And, most importantly, there is no visible sign of a chip on the either of his shoulders.

But arguably the best reason to root for Goetz was the answer he gave to the question at hand.

“I’d have to say it’s the college one I got this past year,” he explained. “College golf for me has been very, very difficult. I was very fortunate to get the opportunity to play at West Virginia. I was not heavily recruited. And I pretty much went from square one there. I had to earn my spot and prove myself. I really wasn’t on a scholarship up until my sophomore and junior year.”

Each year you watch a batch of 18-to 22-year-olds playing in the U.S. Amateur, their games crisp and sharp, their swings dialed in, their destinies seemingly already defined. You see Viktor Hovland go from holding up the Havemeyer Trophy at Pebble Beach in 2018 to being a two-time PGA Tour winner 28 months later, or Collin Morikawa winning two major championships two years after turning pro, and it all looks so easy.

But it’s not, not for many in the field at Oakmont. The 312 players competing this week all have supreme talent to qualify for the biggest amateur golf tournament in the world, but they aren’t all world-beaters.

“Going from square one, to being left at home [not in WVU’s starting lineup] and really struggling, to being able to get a win in college and helping my team out, it’s kind of like comeback complete in a sense,” Goetz said. “That did a lot for me, for sure.”

Justin Aller
Mark Goetz hits his tee shot on the 10th hole during the second round of stroke play at the 2021 U.S. Amateur at Oakmont Country Club.

So now the fun begins. With newfound confidence and a medal in hand for shooting an eight-under 132 in stroke-play qualifying—making just one bogey over 36 holes (the par-4 fifth hole at Oakmont when he returned to play on Wednesday morning)—Goetz heads to match play hopefully unaware that no medalist has gone on to win the championship since Ryan Moore did it in 2004.

Living so close to Oakmont has afforded him a handful of rounds on the brutally difficult W.C. Fownes track, enough to gain some local knowledge that could prove handy before the week is done. That and his incoming group of followers can hopefully counteract the negative medallist mojo.

After his interview, Goetz waited to see who his first-round match play opponent would be. But another rainstorm delayed the start of the Round of 64 and the 12-for-1 playoff for 64th spot for nearly four hours. Eventually, Sweden’s David Nyfjall advanced to match play, and he and Goetz started their match at 7 p.m., grateful to get in at least a few holes. When darkness ended play again, the duo was tied through four holes.

So Goetz waits for Thursday, anxious to see just how long he can make this dream week last. What he’s got going for him is this: Dark skies have followed him before. But he knows the sun can come out again

The post This heartfelt story will have you rooting for Oakmont’s unknown U.S. Amateur medalist appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Mike Zarrilli

By Joel Beall
RB Clyburn hopes his competition appreciates what they’ve accomplished by being here, though he understands why, in the moment, they would not. The U.S. Amateur is essentially an NCAA event, its field filled mostly with the best collegiate golfers in the country. This championship is important, no doubt, yet it is a week written on their calendars along with other prestigious amateur events. Their participation is not so much a feat as it is their fate. “I just wish it’s not lost on them how special it is,” Clyburn muses.

He says this because Clyburn is, for the first time, among their world in Pittsburgh this week as the USGA’s oldest championship visits historic Oakmont Country Club. He knows this because he comes from their world. But he is not part of their world.

Meet Clyburn, the former walk-on wideout turned international basketball player turned referee who will tee it up this week at the 2021 U.S. Amateur.

“It really is an honour,” says Clyburn, 32. “I’m sure no one knows who I am, but that’s OK.”

Given the age range of his fellow competitors this week, let’s start with Clyburn’s own collegiate career. In the early 2000s, he was an outstanding multi-sport athlete at Cartersville High School (Ga.), about 45 miles northwest of Atlanta, who had several options to play sports at the next level. Clyburn chose football at Georgia Tech, joining the program as a preferred walk-on wide receiver. After his redshirt freshman season in 2007, however, coach Chan Gailey left and was replaced by the Navy’s Paul Johnson, who implemented a run-heavy offence for the Yellow Jackets. The change in philosophies turned Clyburn from receiver into a de facto lineman.

“I enjoyed running routes and catching passes,” Clyburn says. “The new offence meant I would get one pass my way, if that, a game.”

Clyburn grew tired of attempting to block smaller, quicker defensive backs and realized football was no longer his calling. After his second season, Clyburn hung up his cleats in hopes of replacing them with high tops. He inquired about walking on to the Georgia Tech’s basketball squad, but the team didn’t host open tryouts, so Clyburn filled his athletic void by playing basketball and golf with friends and joining the club volleyball team while finishing his degree.

When school was over, however, Clyburn eschewed the corporate world to try and fulfill an outlandish dream: travel to Europe and play professional basketball. If that sounds crazy—an intramural player going pro—well, you’re not wrong, and a number of teams dismissed Clyburn due to his lack of college experience. But Clyburn also boasts a 6’7” frame that belies a lights-out shooting touch. Mixed with solid defence, high motor and unquestionable basketball IQ, he proved his mettle to the Derbyshire Arrows, a club on one of the lowest tiers of British basketball, earning a contract.

“For a young kid out of college, I didn’t know if it was the right decision,” Clyburn says. “I had a lot better financial offers to stay at home for a ‘real’ job. But I loved it. It was truly an amazing experience.”

Clyburn played well enough to gain the attention of the Chelsea Gulls of Australia’s Big V league, travelling to Oz at the completion of Derbyshire’s schedule. He continued to improve, playing a full season in Australia before returning to England, this time playing for a higher-tiered club in the Mansfield Giants. Clyburn’s play eventually earned him a spot in the open tryout for the NBA’s Developmental League in 2014, where he showed enough skill to be entered into the D League’s draft pool. He would be a step away from the NBA.

Clyburn, however, never did get drafted. And the timing could not have been worse. “The draft happened at the beginning of November. I had to inform European teams if I was playing by mid-October,” Clyburn says. “I don’t get drafted, and now I don’t have a Euro club.”

Without an agent, Clyburn didn’t like his chances to be acquired midseason, meaning it would be another year before he played competitively. He stayed in the United States, understanding it meant an end to his basketball dreams.

Yet another transition was on the horizon. Clyburn stayed connected with the game by officiating local games in Cartersville, then decided to become a basketball referee full-time in 2015. Since then, Clyburn has vaulted from rec-league to working games for the SEC, Sun Belt and Big South conferences.

“It’s a lot of fun,” Clyburn says. “Keeps the competitive juices flowing.”

Clyburn did not entirely retire to the role of spectator, though. Throughout his journeys with football, volleyball and basketball, Clyburn continued to pursue as best he could what he says was his true passion: golf.

Clyburn was a member of his high school’s golf team and played in a handful of top Georgia amateur events beginning in 2008. When he returned to America, Clyburn was able to dedicate more time to the game. Playing out of Cartersville Country Club, he got his handicap down to a plus-6.4 and by 2018 had qualified for the Georgia Open. At this year’s U.S. Amateur qualifier at Capital City Club’s Crabapple course in Atlanta, Clyburn turned in rounds of 66 and 67 and survived a two-for-one playoff to grab the fifth and final spot out of a 132-player field and qualify for Oakmont.

“You compete in these events believing you can make it,” he says, “but to do it was a great feeling.”

His background, age and journey makes Clyburn a Cinderella story this week, and he is under no delusion about the odds against him at one of the world’s toughest courses. The field has 312 competitors playing Oakmont, along with nearby Longue Vue Club, in stroke-play qualifying to advance to 64 match-play spots. It’s a difficult path to walk for even the most experienced USGA competitors.

Conversely, he is not merely happy to be a part of the proceedings. “I think I have a shot,” Clyburn says. “Large greens, not a lot of large penalty areas. Just have to keep it in front of me to make it to match play. There, it’s one-on-one, and who knows what could happen.”

He also thinks his experience as a referee will come in handy. “It’s really helpful,” he says. “When I get yelled at by coaches and berated by fans, you try to block out the noise. You have to be right if you’re a ref. We all miss plays, but you have to be good at making the right call under pressure.

“I think that correlates to tournament golf. If you’re going to succeed playing against the best, you have to have your best stuff when it matters most.”

Yet while he is a competitor, Clyburn, more than most, understands life is not found in an end goal but in the pursuit of it. He knows making it this far is something to be celebrated. It’s hard to imagine anyone having a more circuitous, adventurous route to the tee box than him, and he’s going to enjoy whatever awaits.

“It’s great,” Clyburn says. “To be able to put my game up against the best amateur players at one of the best venues … what more can you ask for?”

The post If you’re looking for a Cinderella story at the U.S. Amateur at Oakmont, try R.B. Clyburn appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Tod Leonard
BANDON, Ore. — The U.S. Amateur had another interesting rules issue on Saturday in the semifinals at Bandon Dunes, but this one wasn’t nearly as contentious as the caddie controversy in the Round of 16.

In a tied match between Matthew Sharpstene and Charles Osborne, Sharpstene loaded up his backswing from the middle of the fairway at the par-4 fifth and then brought himself to a screeching halt, a la Tiger Woods in his heyday. Sharpstene saw his ball move ever so slightly on the right fescue before the downswing.

He could have continued the swing without penalty—maybe other than a wayward shot—but the 21-year-old instead called for a rules official. Daniela Lendl—the daughter of former tennis star Ivan Lendl—came over to hear the situation. Sharpstene and his father, Jeff, who is caddying for him this week, explained that the ball didn’t move until the club was in the air.

That doesn’t matter. “It’s not always going to move right away,” Lendl said as TV microphones picked up the conversation. “If he had the club there, taking it away may have caused the action.”

Sharpstene calmly said he understood, and after replacing the ball and taking a one-stroke penalty, he rifled a shot to eight feet behind the hole. He had a chance to forge an amazing halve on the hole when Osborne made par, but Sharpstene’s putt burned the left edge of the cup. He made bogey and lost the hole to go 1 down.

The tournament already had a much-ballyhooed controversy on Thursday when the caddie for Segundo Oliva Pinto was deemed to have tested the sand on the 18th hole, and the Argentine lost the hole and the match to Tyler Strafaci.

The post Another rules issue at U.S. Amateur, but this one didn’t cause a furore appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Tod Leonard
BANDON, Ore. — For most of his life, Tyler Strafaci has heard about the greatness of a man he never met. His grandfather, Frank Strafaci, died 10 years before Tyler was born, but he has loomed large in a golf-obsessed family because of the respect he earned as a person and a top-level amateur player.

On regular trips to play at the Pinehurst Resort in North Carolina, Tyler’s dad, Frank Jr., made sure they always stopped to check out the locker with grandpa’s name on it—Frank Sr.’s reward for twice capturing the prestigious North and South Amateur in the late 1930s.

Never in his wildest dreams could Tyler have imagined sharing that feat with his grandfather, but he pulled it off July 5, wrapping up the North and South at Pinehurst No. 2 with a 3-and-1 win over 2019 U.S. Amateur semifinalist William Holcomb V. No other grandfather-grandson combo had done it.

Mission accomplished for one summer. Legacy fulfilled, right?

Not even close. Frank Strafaci Sr. also won a USGA title, the 1935 U.S. Amateur Public Links, and, with due respect, 85 years later his grandson has a chance to possibly one-up him. Tyler Strafaci is two match-play victories away from seizing the 120th U.S. Amateur Championship, with the first of those showdowns on Saturday at Bandon Dunes Golf Course.

The 22-year-old Strafaci, a Georgia Tech fifth-year senior from Davie, Fla., faces Oklahoma State rising junior Aman Gupta, 21, in one semifinal, with Charles (Ollie) Osborne, 20, taking on Matthew Sharpstene, 21, in the other match. The survivors meet in the 36-hole final on Sunday.

Steven Gibbons
Tyler Strafaci plays his third shot to the first hole during the quarterfinal round at the 2020 U.S. Amateur.

Strafaci advanced out of Friday’s quarterfinals by beating a player who has become a good friend—mid-amateur stalwart Stewart Hagestad, who pushed his young competitor to the par-5 18th, only for the 29-year-old to desperately lash a driver shot off the deck into a hazard, allowing Strafaci to close it out with a two-putt par.

“I thought I played fantastic,” Tyler Strafaci said. “I made some really good putts early on. I had three up-and-downs from a bunker in a row [at Nos. 3, 4, 5], and hit it [close] at 6 [to take his first lead].” Another strike he’ll remember—an “obliterated” 250-yard 5-iron that led to another birdie at 9 and a 2-up advantage.

Strafaci also had to deal with some adversity, suffering back-to-back bogeys that let Hagestad get tied through 15, only to have the older player push his approach to the right at 17 into a hazard, suffer bogey and drop 1-down again.

“I knew when I drew Ty that we were going to have a real tough one today,” Hagestad said. “He’s a good golfer, but he’s just such a mature person, and that comes from both his parents.

“His ranking [56 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings] doesn’t reflect what he is. He’s a stud.”

On the bag, keeping Tyler focused and upbeat while lending an ear to his frustrations has been his father, Frank Jr., an accomplished golfer who competed in a handful of USGA events. Frank, 62, hadn’t caddied much for Tyler since the junior golf days, but, as a Father’s Day gesture, the son asked his dad to loop in both the North and South and U.S. Amateur.

Frank was ready, having trimmed down by 30 pounds while riding a bike during the coronavirus pandemic.

“It’s been great,” Tyler said of the teamwork. “Excuse my language, but I can bitch at him sometimes. If I’m stressed out there, he understands. He knows my game better than anybody. So I have him out there to calm me down.

“Usually,” Tyler admitted, “I haven’t liked him caddieing because we’d bicker back and forth. But he knows I’m at a level know where I’m in control of my game. Here’s there to push me along instead of teaching me. He’s there to reinforce and keep my head straight.”

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By Tod Leonard
BANDON, Ore. — Stewart Hagestad pushed his cell phone across the conference table in the Bandon Dunes Golf Course clubhouse. On his screen was the text he had received at 5 a.m. on Thursday, a couple of hours before his Round of 32 match in the U.S. Amateur Championship.

“Unbeliveable,” Hagestad said with quiet exasperation. “You’ve got to be kidding, right?”

The message was from an administrator in the MBA program at the University of Southern California. It basically contained an ultimatum: Hagestad needed to be on Zoom calls on Thursday and Friday to continue his orientation for the program. If he missed them, he’d be eliminated as a candidate. In a pre-emptive bid, he had composed a thoughtful email explaining his situation—that he’d reached matchplay in the U.S. Amateur and could he please postpone the calls? The answer: a flat “no.”

“We talk about the discussions I have with the kids out here,” Hagestad said. “That’s a real-life decision off the golf course that you have to deal with. You wake up for a 36-hole day with that on your mind.”

There are 16 players remaining in the tournament after two rounds of match play were completed on Thursday. They are all accomplished in their own right. But only one of them is working toward an MBA while holding down a real-world job. Only one of them is 29 years old.

Hagestad is this year’s aged outlier in the U.S. Am, the only player left who started playing when anybody who regularly hit 300-yard drives was a legend and college was as much about the next party as it was preparing to turn pro as soon as possible.

A career amateur who is talented enough to have won the 2016 Mid-Amateur, to have made the cut in the 2017 Masters, to have played on two winning U.S. Walker Cup squads, Hagestad continues to find new ways to push himself. The Newport Beach, Calif., native didn’t make the cut in the first eight times he played the U.S. Am, but has subsequently reached match play four straight years. And now he’s gone farther than ever before in this championship by reaching the quarterfinals. [His best previous effort was getting to the Round of 16 at Pebble Beach in 2018.]

Hagestad is treading increasingly rare ground. The last mid-amateur to reach the U.S. Am’s quarterfinals was Nathan Smith in 2014. Austin Eaton, in 2005, was the last to advance to the semis, and Tom McKnight the last to make the finals in 1998. The last to seize the title was 41-year-old John Harris in 1993—before any of this year’s other seven quarterfinalists were born.

Understand, though, that Hagestad isn’t your usual mid-amateur either. He has a job in the financial world that affords him plenty of work flexibility and practice time. From March to October, he says he practices five to seven days a week and works out nearly that much.

“Dude, these kids are good,” Hagestad said. “You have to take it seriously. You can’t take it for granted. These kids are baby tour pros.”

In three rounds of match play on a demanding Bandon Dunes track made more ornery by heavy winds that blew the flags violently on Thursday afternoon, Hagestad has beaten an 18-year-old (Abel Gallegos in the Round of 64) and two 21-year-olds (Spencer Tibbits in the Round of 32 and Harrison Ott in the Round of 16). Since overcoming a 2-down deficit through 11 holes against Gallegos, Hagestad hasn’t trailed, and he scored his most sizeable win on Thursday by defeating Ott, 4 and 3.

Asked what his advantages are in this circumstance, Hagestad said, “It’s a good question, because I’ve kind of been asking myself the same thing. I consider myself a pretty darned good wedge player. My short irons and wedges, I feel like I’m just as good as any of them. If I putt well, I feel like I’m a tough out. … I just feel like even if I don’t have my best stuff, I can at least bring enough firepower to make it interesting.”

On Friday afternoon, Hagestad is set to take on 22-year-old Georgia Tech senior Tyler Strafaci, who advanced out of the Round of 16 in bizarre fashion, when the caddie of his opponent, Segundo Oliva Pinto, committed a rules violation that decided the match on the 18th hole.

Strafaci said on Thursday that he and Hagestad became friends when they were paired together in the stroke-play rounds in the U.S. Amateur at Pebble Beach. They grew closer getting practice squad reps in advance of the 2019 Walker Cup.

“Stew is unbelievable,” said Strafaci, who won the North & South Amateur title earlier this summer. “Every mid-am in this field is great. But Stew … he could play on tour right now. [Friday’s] match is going to be gritty. I know I’m going to have to play the best I’ve played to beat him.”

Hagestad has always said that he didn’t want to bang heads with the world’s best pro players, that he’s been happy to mix it up with friends and be motivated to play at the top amateur level. This week, he’s certainly defined that desire again, considering the high personal stakes he chose in competing.

“I do know if you play well in big events like these, people, care, they pay attention,” Hagestad said. “I would argue to say that if you make a Walker Cup team, that’s an impressive feat. And I wasn’t willing to give that up.”

An MBA can wait. A U.S. Amateur title would be priceless.

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By Tod Leonard
BANDON, Ore. — Put together 264 golfers of closely matched skill sets. Have them play 36 holes to whittle the collection to just 64. Both the odds and logic say you’re going to get a bunch of them trying to squeeze through a bottleneck to safety. It’s the beauty of the USGA’s format for the U.S. Amateur, creating more drama for those on the bubble than the contenders for medalist honours.

It can also be a royal pain, especially when there are too many stubborn golfers who won’t go away. For Wednesday morning, it looked like a charge to the hills for the Gold Rush up here when 18 men, having tied at two-over par, took to the 10th tee in three groups on the Bandon Dunes course to battle for a mere three spots in the match play that begins later in the day.

The competition lasted all of two holes, with Cameron Sisk, a soon-to-be junior at Arizona State and Evan Katz (senior, Duke) scoring birdies on the first hole. Aaron Du, originally from China and set to begin college at Cal, notched the lone birdie on the second hole to complete the match-play field of 64.

Du had a wild finish on Tuesday to making the playoff, going triple bogey, birdie, birdie, bogey, birdie.

Eighteen people—one for each hole if they went out in singles in a shotgun start—seems particularly onerous and complicated to manage, but the USGA has been doing this a long time and has seen far bigger traffic jams. In fact, 18 gets kind of an indifferent shrug. The record is 33 playoff contenders for 10 places in 1988 at Virginia Hot Springs. On four other occasions, there have been at least 25 contestants, and it could be argued that the most sinister playoff came at Pinehurst just last year, when 27 poor souls were scratching for three spots—a nearly four-hour ordeal well documented by Golf Digest.

Four hopefuls bogeyed their final hole Tuesday on either Bandon Dunes or Bandon Trails and none of them ended up reaching match play.

Seven players clutched up and birdied their final holes, including Sisk.

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By Tod Leonard
It was a gorgeous evening for golf. Clear, just a light breeze, and the bright orange sun was beginning to set on the Pacific Ocean. It was the kind of day golfers pray for when they make a pilgrimage to one of America’s golf meccas, Bandon Dunes.

“Beautiful,” Andy Ogletree said.

Ogletree walked the back nine holes of the Bandon Dunes Golf Course without a club in hand. It was a scouting trip of a layout he’d never seen, but on which he’ll compete starting Monday when he begins defense of the U.S. Amateur Championship title he captured last year at Pinehurst.

Six months ago, Ogletree, 22, could not have imagined he’d be marvelling at sunsets on the Oregon coast. With this U.S. Am win, he earned playing spots in the Masters, U.S. Open and Open Championship. Finishing up his senior year at Georgia Tech, he was looking forward to all of them. But now in August, none of them have been played. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the U.S. Open was moved to September, the Masters to November and the Open Championship cancelled.

It all turned Ogletree’s life and career plans completely upside down. The Union, Miss., native hoped to be playing professionally by late summer, but instead remains an amateur, and thus has the opportunity to be the first golfer to repeat as the U.S. Am champion since Tiger Woods won three straight from 1994-’96. Back for another Am, too, is last year’s other finalist, John Augenstein, who decided to return to Vanderbilt for a fifth year instead of turning pro.

A golfer even attempting to win the Havemeyer Trophy for a second straight year is a rare occurrence. Not since Gunn Yang, who won the 2014 U.S. Am at age 20, has a winner returned the following year. The last four champions—Bryson DeChambeau, Curtis Luck, Doc Redman and Viktor Hovland—all turned pro in the year after their Am triumph.

Ogletree’s defense comes against a smaller but arguably stronger field that includes 98 golfers who played in last year’s championship. The pandemic made it impossible for the USGA to hold qualifiers, and just as with its other top championships, including the U.S. Open, the governing body created an all-exempt field of 264, down from the usual 312. The format remains the same: 36 holes of stroke play on the Bandon Dunes and Bandon Trails courses, followed by the top 64 from medal play advancing to match play at Bandon Dunes, building up to the 36-hole final on Sunday.

The unpredictable nature of match play would seemingly make it more difficult to repeat in the format, but Ogletree shrugged that theory off in a phone conversation last week.

“Good golf is good golf,” he said. “If you play better than anyone else, you’re going to win. I’m looking forward to the week. Last year, I didn’t come in thinking I could win. I didn’t have a lot of expectations. I definitely have a lot more confidence this year that I can win, that I can handle the pressure and everything that goes with winning the tournament.”

The perks for winning the Am go far beyond getting into the three majors and the hero’s welcome Ogletree got in his hometown. Victory makes you a prime candidate for the U.S. Walker Cup team, and Ogletree contributed to the Americans’ win at Royal Liverpool last September. It also sends you to the top of the sponsor’s exemption list of some PGA Tour tournament directors. In Ogletree’s case, he got three invites—for the Charles Schwab Challenge at Colonial, where the tour returned to play after its hiatus, the RBC Heritage at Harbour Town and the Memorial at Muirfield Village.

DC
Andy Ogletree hits a shot during the 2019 Walker Cup Match at Royal Liverpool.

The Memorial, originally scheduled the week before the U.S. Open, was always a given for Ogletree, but after he had to turn down exemptions earlier in the year due to college conflicts, he was thrilled to get into the other two events in the early summer. The opportunities somewhat softened the disappointment when another week rolled around and Ogletree saw the social-media posts about “This would have been Masters week or U.S. Open week.”

Weighing the pros and cons of his situation, Ogletree said, “Honestly, everyone has missed out on a lot of stuff. There’s been a lot of cons for the whole world. But the pros for me is that I get to play these events as an amateur without it being my job.”

Ogletree missed the cut in all three, shooting respectable scores in the Schwab (73-69) and Heritage (73-70) before struggling in the almost major-like conditions of the Memorial (77-81).

Deeply disappointed about his play at Muirfield Village, Ogletree was cleaning out his locker on Friday when he heard a distinctly recognizable voice. “It was Mr. [Jack] Nicklaus,” said Ogletree, who made it a point to introduce himself. “We talked about the U.S. Am and my future plans. He told me to keep getting better and don’t worry about the week. He said it’s a long career.”

Meeting Nicklaus was among the many highlights of being out on tour. Ogletree played practice rounds with Bill Haas and Lucas Glover—the trio share the same coach—as well as Phil Mickelson, Ryan Palmer, Keegan Bradley and Brendan Steele. There were two others who stood out: He practiced with Webb Simpson before he won the RBC and Jon Rahm before he captured the Memorial.

“I’m going to try to play the next one by myself,” Ogletree joked. “I’m not trying to say it was me, but …”

In November, as would have been the case in April, Ogletree will be paired in the first two rounds of the Masters with reigning champion Tiger Woods. They still have not officially met; Ogletree said Woods waved at him with a “hey” when they walked by each other at Muirfield Village.

“Tiger big-leagued me, but that’s OK,” Ogletree said with a laugh.

More seriously he said, “To get to play with Tiger will be the coolest. I have to pinch myself about it. That’s going to be a special week.”

Rob Tringali
Andy Ogletree stands “on the tee” in the backyard hole his dad built at their family home in Union, Miss., when his oldest son first starting playing golf.

Ogletree, currently ranked ninth in the World Amateur Golf Ranking, enters the U.S. Amateur coming off reaching the quarterfinals of the Western Amateur that was held at Crooked Stick in Indiana. He will have his dad, Jim, as his one designated supporter on the grounds and Georgia Tech assistant coach Devin Stanton returns to the bag after last year’s triumph. With the three PGA Tour events under his belt, Ogleetree contends those experiences are extremely valuable when going against the amateurs.

“I feel like my game is in a good spot,” he said. “I’m in a good spot, mentally. Everything has come together.”

Or at least the best it could under the bizarre nature of our current circumstances. Ogletree has the good fortune of being able to look forward to some extraordinary experiences coming up. Beyond that horizon, though, his future isn’t nearly as clear as the skies that day in Oregon.

“I’m weighing my options,” Ogletree said. “I could turn pro after the Masters or I could even go back to school. The Walker Cup is at Seminole in May. That was one of the coolest weeks of my life. I’m just going to have to figure out what works best for me.”

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