Meyer marches into Western Am semifinal; Horsfield also advances

Writing from Lake Forest, Illinois

Friday, August 5, 2016

There was a time when Dylan Meyer and match play didn’t get along.

That’s a long time back.

Meyer, going into his junior year at Illinois caught on through the good offices of Fighting Illini head coach Mike Small. Since then, he’s been stout, and proved it again Friday afternoon, when, despite not hitting the ball quite as well as in his morning match, dispatched Doug Ghim of Arlington Heights and Texas 5 and 4 to advance to the Saturday’s semifinal match in the 114th Western Amateur at the Knollwood Club.

“I played pretty solid,” Meyer said. “I started to hit the driver good, and Doug, he played solid all the way.”

There were two turning points. The first was the combination of Ghim’s three-putt green at the third and Meyer’s birdie 2 at the fourth, which gave Meyer a 2-up advantage. He would never let it shrink.

“I gave him a little bit of momentum with the three-putt,” Ghim said. “I don’t feel I played that poorly. Dylan was playing great.”

The second was the dagger Meyer threw at Ghim on the 13th hole, a par-4 with the tees moved up to 309 yards to encourage players to go for the elevated green.

Meyer laid up in the fairway, 91 yards distant. Ghim went for it and came up just short.

Then Meyer took a 52-degree wedge in hand and stuck the approach 18 inches from the cup for a conceded birdie. Ghim chipped four feet past and missed the comebacker to halve the hole, which meant Meyer was dormie 5. When they halved the 14th hole, it was handshake time.

“He did what you have to do in match play,” Ghim said of Meyer.

It goes back to the lessons learned from Small, and the experience gained in the NCAA tournament’s team match play competition, as well as the made-for-TV East Lake Cup, the last few years.

“After my match with Aaron (Wise in the NCAA final) I got a big boost in confidence,” Meyer said, too modest to mention he beat Wise, the NCAA individual champion, 1 up in the team portion of the proceedings. “I used to do too much in match play. You can think too far ahead in that. Match play is shot-by-shot. Stroke play, you can plan out your entire round.”

Meyer will meet William Gordon, a sophomore at Vanderbilt who hails from Davidson, N.C., in Saturday’s second semifinal, an 8:15 a.m. start. That showdown will be preceded by an 8 a.m. match between runaway medalist Sam Horsfield, who escaped a pair of jams on Friday, and Alabama sophomore David Riley of Hattiesburg, Miss.

With Englishman Horsfield carrying Florida colors, there are three Southeastern Conference representatives in the Final Four, along with Meyer, who waves the flag of the Big Ten.

Horsfield was a nine-stroke winner in the qualifying portion of the program, but that meant nothing when he met Joaquin Niemann, the 17-year-old from Santiago, Chile, in the opening match of Friday morning’s Sweet Sixteen. The lead changed hands three times, with Niemann’s par on the par-3 17th squaring the match for the fourth time. Horsfield had to birdie the 19th to advance to the quarterfinals. There, Horsfield ran out to a 4-up lead on countryman J.J. Grey, a recent Georgia State grad, only to see Grey whittle it away on the back nine, squaring the match when Horsfield hooked his tee shot out of bounds on the 16th.

But Grey squandered his break, bogeying the final two holes to allow Horsfield a 2 up victory.

Riley took down Northbrook’s Nick Hardy, 4 and 2, in the round of 16, then scored a 1 up victory over John Coultas in the quarterfinals.

Gordon toppled Andy Zhang of Beijing, China, 4 & 3 in the morning, and survived 1 up against Baylor’s Braden Bailey in the afternoon.

Around Knollwood

Meyer, Riley and Gordon all survived Thursday's playoff for the final match play spots. ... The result of the other morning matches: Grey defeated Greyson Sigg 3 and 2, Coultas beat Vincent Whaley 2 and 1, Meyer knocked off Michael DeMorat 1 up, Ghim beat Max McGreevey with a birdie on the 19th, and Bailey subdued Eric Ricard 1 up. ... There were small galleries with each of the quarterfinal groups, but no more than 250 people were on hand at any one time for a day of splendid golf. Admission is free. ... Among the rules officials on hand were recently-retired PGA Tour veteran Jon Brendle, who was the set-up man for the Western Open / BMW Championship for years, and former USGA director of rules and competitions Tom Meeks. ... 

– Tim Cronin

Horsfield romps to Western Am qualifying medal

Writing from Lake Forest, Illinois

Thursday, August 4, 2016

Sam Horsfield won a 72-hole tournament at the Knollwood Club on Thursday afternoon, and did so going away.

Come Friday morning, that will only mean the Englishman who plays for the Florida Gators has the No. 1 seed.

And that doesn’t mean a lot in the Western Amateur, which boasts the most tested field in amateur golf and a ravenous format the cuts the field to 16 for match play. The medalist is 4-6 in his first round match the last 10 years.

Horsfield’s achievement, though, was a cut above the usual, in that for the second time in four rounds he flirted with the course record – and this time, did so already owning a share of it.

He’d fired an 8-under-par 63 in the first round, and, having separated himself from the field and runner-up Michael DeMorat in the first nine of his afternoon round, felt he could let loose. He led DeMorat by a stroke after both the second round and the third, when they each scored 4-under 67, but went out a 3-under 32 to DeMorat’s all-par 35 to expand the lead to four strokes.

“I didn’t have anything to worry about at this point, so I just kinda played for fun,” Horsfield said. “My caddie and I talked and said we were just going to play it like a practice round. It was just a lot of fun and pretty cool.”

Fun and pretty cool as in birdies on the first four holes on the back, running him to 15-under. If he had been in a match with DeMorat in the final round, he would have been 4 up with five to play. Horsfield parred the 14th, and birdied the next two. At that point, he was 9-under on the round and 17-under overall – and leading by 11.

A pair of pars would have brought him home in 62 for a Knollwood and Western Amateur stroke play qualifying record. Instead, he missed the green with his tee shot on the par-3 17th and failed to get up and down, then hit his approach just short at the last and ran his birdie putt from the front fringe just by the right side of the cup. Missing the comebacker meant two bogeys to finish and settling for 7-under 64 and 15-under 269.

“I hit it really good the first day, and the second day I struggled (to a 75), but today, toward the end of my first round, I started hitting a couple of squirrely shots,” Horsfield said. “I figured it out on the range afterward. I think I was a little bit tired. This afternoon, I was just in control of my game.”

Horsfield plays playoff survivor Joaquin Niemann of Santiago, Chile, in Friday’s opening match of the Round of 16.

“It’s a whole new golf tournament,” Horsfield said. “To make it to match play, you’re obviously a great player. I’m looking forward to the challenge.”

Horsfield has played well before, but couldn’t quantify how well this performance stacked up.

“I could have been a little bit better, but that’s nitpicking at things. Overall, it was pretty solid,” Horsfield said.

Pouring in 27 birdies in 72 holes usually is.

Around Knollwood

Two Illinois residents and one more with Illinois connections made the Sweet Sixteen. Northbrook’s Nick Hardy (3-under 281) and Arlington Heights’ Doug Ghim (2-under 282) made it, representing Illinois and Texas collegiately respectively, along with Dylan Meyer (even-par 284), Hardy’s Fighting Illini teammate. ... Less fortunate was Bloomington’s Todd Mitchell, who scored 1-over 72 in the morning and blew up to 11-over 82 in the afternoon. He bogeyed seven holes on the front nine for 42 and scored 40, capped by a double-bogey at the last, in the afternoon.

– Tim Cronin

Mitchell golden oldie at Western Am; Ghim lurks

Writing from Lake Forest, Illinois

Wednesday, August 3, 2016

Todd Mitchell said college golf has changed since his days in that sphere.

“College and high school kids now are exceptionally talented, play almost every week, practice a lot,” Mitchell said. “They’re like tour players, almost. When I first started, I don’t know if it was the Tiger effect, but he never talked with anybody. And there wasn’t a lot of socializing.

“But I’ve noticed the past two or three years, they come up and talk a lot. They obviously know I’m not in college any more, and ask how old I am, what I’ve done, and then more questions come.”

Maybe it’s because Mitchell is 38, bald, and is as likely to sell you an insurance policy at the turn as he is to shoot 70. He may be looked upon by them as an anomaly as much as anything, like an exhibit in a museum.

That would be a mistake, for Mitchell is as competitive as they come. And 70, by the by, was the Bloomington basher’s score on Wednesday at the Knollwood Club in the second stroke-play qualifying round of the 114th Western Amateur.

Add it to Thursday’s 69 and Mitchell owns a stylish 3-under 139, good for a tie for second, a stroke behind leader Sam Horsfield, entering Thursday’s 36-hole battle for spots in the Sweet Sixteen.

Take that, kiddies.

Mitchell accomplished it despite bogeying three of his first four holes.

“I just basically had a pep talk with myself,” Mitchell said. “Just said, ‘Hey, this isn’t anything new. Just go out and play.’ I don’t know if it was nerves starting out, but I felt I was moving really, really fast. I got into the swing of things on No. 5 (a 426-yard par 4). I hit a shot in there to 1 1/2 feet and made it. That kind of jump-started some things. I made two more birdies coming in and just kind of hung together on the back.

“I’m extremely happy with the way I gutted it around today.”

Gutted was the proper pronoun on a day where Knollwood’s greens – destined to be killed on Tuesday and replaced by new turf – were running faster by the hour. Fred Wedel of Pepperdine, who shot 75-73–128 and missed the cut, called them U.S. Open greens, and not in a complimentary fashion. “It was impossible,” he tweeted.

It wasn’t for Doug Ghim, the Arlington Heights whiz who matched Mitchell’s 139. He eschewed putting entirely on his last hole, the ninth, by chipping in for birdie after his approach skidded off the rock-hard green.

“I’m drawing on the experience of two years ago (when he was at Beverly),” Ghim said. “This course is kind of similar. The greens are firm – maybe firmer than at Beverly. They’re very fast. Very difficult if you’re not in the right spot. You’ve got to commit to every shot.’’

Oklahoma senior Max McGreevy had the move of the day, climbing from a tie for 121st after a first-round 77 to a tie for 18th via a sparkling 5-under 66. McGreevy, one of the several All-Big 12 team members at Knollwood Club, fared far better than Horsfield, whose 75 was a dozen strokes higher than his record-matching 63 in the opening round.

But Horsfield’s aggregate of 4-under 138 keeps him a stroke up on the field, though the real object is to be among the top 16 at nightfall on Thursday, and thus qualify for match play. The cut fell at 3-over 145, and includes 53 players, including Illinois Amateur champ Nick Hardy (141), Hardy’s Illinois teammate Dylan Meyer (143) and CDGA Amateur champ Andrew Price (144), the latter the only mid-amateur besides Mitchell to make it.

Around Knollwood

Defending champion Dawson Armstrong missed the cut, firing a pair of 76s for 10-over 152 and a trip back to Brentwood, Tenn. ... Newly-minted NHL referee Garrett Rank also missed the cut. ... Former U.S. Amateur champion Gunn Yang shot 85-83, his 168 missing the trim by 23 strokes. Aside from Peter Malik withdrawing, Yang was last in the field. ... Aaron Wise, whom Armstrong beat on the 20th hole of last year’s final at Rich Harvest Farms, won on the PGA Tour’s Canadian circuit last week in his third tournament playing for cold cash, and will be at the John Deere Classic next week.

– Tim Cronin

Horsfield lives up to billing, humbles Knollwood

Writing from Lake Forest, Illinois

Tuesday, August 2, 2016

Put 10 threes on your scorecard and you’ve had a fine day.

World No. 2 amateur Sam Horsfield did that on Tuesday and tied the course record at the leafy Knollwood Club in the first qualifying round of the 114th Western Amateur.

Horsfield, a lad from Birmingham, England who is entering his sophomore year at Florida after an all-America freshman campaign, used those threes – and nary a deuce – to post an 8-under-par 63 take the lead by three strokes entering Wednesday’s second round.

Eric Ricard, entering his senior year at Louisiana State, is second after his 5-under 66. Vincent Whaley of Georgia Tech and Won Jun Lee of South Korea is third at 4-under 67, followed by Arlington Heights native Doug Ghim of Texas and Michael Perras of Houston.

The object is to simply make the Sweet Sixteen for match play, which begins Friday after 72 holes of qualifying in three days. Thursday’s 36-hole grind will involve only the low 44 and those tied from the field of 156.

Horsfield’s 63, which matched the course record posted by Max Scodro a few years ago, also equaled Ghim’s score at Beverly two years ago for the lowest known single round in Western Amateur qualifying.

Normally a par 72 for the members, Knollwood is a par 71 this week, the sixth hole adjusted to a par 4 even at 504 yards. That made little matter to Horsfield, who made a 4 on the hole anyway. He had gone out in 5-under 31 on the back nine, including birdies on five of his last six holes, then birdied the par-4 first to stand 6-under through 10, and added birdies on the fifth and eighth holes to go with scintillating par saves on the seventh and ninth to finish with a bogey-free 63.

“I felt like I had been close for a while and to kind of put it together and shoot a good score felt really good,” Horsfield said. “All the right things clicked, and it was fun.”

It usually is when you hit 12 fairways, 17 greens and make almost everything you look at, including a six-footer to save par on the seventh.

“I hit it the best I’ve hit it in a while,” Horsfield said. “When you do that, youu will have some birdie opportunities. I hit three or four shots inside of two feet. That takes some of the stress off.”

Around Knollwood

Andrew Price of Lake Bluff, who won the CDGA Amateur last month, opened with 2-over 73. Todd Mitchell of Bloomington, whom Price defeated, scored 2-under 69, the best tally of the few mid-amateurs in the field, good for a tie for seventh. ... With a 1-under 70, Northbrook’s Nick Hardy won the laurel for low Illinois team member, beating Dylan Meyer (71) . Ohio State grad Tim “Tee-K” Kelly scored 3-over 74. ... Defender Dawson Armstrong, whose up-and-down for birdie on the par-5 eighth was among the better shots of the day, but blew up on the back nine for 5-over 36-40–76. ... A country and western singer / guitar player brought in for the player party started his post-round warbling promptly at 6 p.m., even though players were still finishing on both nines, including the nearby ninth green. “It’s now the Country and Western Amateur,” said one wag.

– Tim Cronin

Sainz sets records in winning Illinois Open

Writing from St. Charles

Wednesday, July 27, 2016 

Carlos Sainz Jr. picked up a trophy in his first Illinois Open appearance, back in 2006.

He was low amateur, a good showing for a 20-year-old.

Wednesday at Royal Fox Country Club, he did himself one better. Sainz won the 67th Illinois Open by five strokes with a record score of 17-under-par 197.

“It’s big,” Sainz said. “I’ve wanted to win this the last four or five years since I turned pro.”

He succeeded in grand fashion, firing his second straight 6-under 65, this one bogey free, at Royal Fox to go with an opening 5-under 67 at Royal Hawk Country Club. The back-to-back 65s for 130 don’t add up to a record – David Cooke, the winner last year at Royal Melbourne, still owns that – but Sainz wrested the scoring and relation-to-par marks away from Cooke in style.

With one bogey in his last 45 holes, Sainz played with the demeanor of a confident man. With family and friends from Elgin on hand, he walked on the first tee with a four-stroke lead and birdied four of the first six holes, including a 40-footer up a ridge on the par-4 third hole. That expanded his lead to five strokes over eventual runner-up Christian Heavens of Fairview Heights and to six over Chicagoan Brad Hopfinger, who took third.

Birds on the fourth and sixth followed, and it was then only a matter of how many rather than who. The dagger came on the 16th, when he punctuated a curling 25-footer for a birdie 3 with a fist pump and a celebratory walk to the cup.

“Those were bonuses,” Sainz said. But he also said, “You have to believe they’re going in.”

Sainz believed deeply this week. With his mother Rose as his nominal caddie, Sainz played his best golf since winning a mini-tour tournament in Florida earlier this year. Since then, he’s played good but not great golf, working on his swing and getting into tournaments when he could. It’s tough to keep one’s confidence intact during such a stretch, especially after losing one’s PGA Tour card.

“Confidence is a lot in this game,” Sainz said. “The guys on tour, they say that when you’re playing well, you have to feel you can win the tournament.”

That’s what Sainz is aiming for on a regular basis.

“I felt good all the way,” Sainz said. “I knew they had to come catch me today.”

The victory, more than the $17,500 first prize, will boost that confidence when he jumps on the Mackenzie Tour, the PGA Tour’s Canadian operation, for the weeks leading to the Tour’s qualifying tournaments. The better he plays in Canada, the fewer “Q School” stages he has to play in.

Heavens’ 5-under 66 for a total of 12-under 202 – which would have won all but four 54-hole Illinois Opens – was built on a fast start, the highlight a 10-foot eagle putt on the sixth hole after a brilliant approach. But Heavens could never get closer than four strokes, that after birdies on the 10th and 11th holes, which Sainz parred, and again after a deuce on the 17th.

Hopfinger was similarly climbing uphill all day. His best run was a stretch of three birdies on five holes to start the back nine, which moved him to 11-under. Sainz was 16 under by the 14th hole.

In finishing fourth, Northbrook’s Nick Hardy accomplished what Sainz did a decade ago, capturing the low amateur award. Wednesday’s 3-under 68 put Hardy at 9-under 205.

“I had nothing to lose, so I went to make as many birdies as I could,” Hardy said. “I played all right. I did not putt like I normally do this whole tournament. That’s kind of what held me back and why I didn’t finish like Carlos did. That’s golf.

“Last week they were going in. This week they weren’t.”

Hardy made 15 birdies in three rounds, but missed birdie attempts, rather than his six bogeys, held him back.

Hardy may be going from strength to strength. He won the Illinois Amateur last week at St. Charles Country Club, and next week competes in the Western Amateur at Knollwood Club in Lake Forest. Those two tight treelined parkland courses are more similar to each other than either is to Royal Fox, a Dick Nugent layout opened in 1990.

“The greens are different, the way they roll and react to shots,” Hardy said of Royal Fox to St. Charles.

Amateurs Kevin Flack of Belvidere and Branden Mounce of El Paso and Mistwood pro Andy Mickelson tied for fifth at 7-under 207. Flack’s 65 moved him up from a tie for 25th entering the round.

Royal Hawk head professional Brian Carroll, who with Heavens was a first round co-leader, finished in a tie for 12th at 4-under 210 after a 1-under 70. 

Around Royal Fox

Illinois head men’s coach Mike Small and recruit Tommy Kuhl of Morton played in the third-from-last threesome and ended up among those tied for ninth at 5-under 209. Both shot even-par 71, while Tim “Tee-K” Kelly, the Ohio State stalwart from Wheaton, posted a 65. ... Carlos Sainz’ brother Michael scored 2-under 69 for even par 214 and tied for 24th. ... Christian Heavens made $13,000 for second place, $500 more than the first money Vince India collected last year after finishing second to amateur David Cooke. ... Cooke tied for 29th this year after a closing 70 for 1-over 215. ... Chris French, at 2-under 141 through 36 holes, withdrew late Tuesday after the final round pairings were made, telling officials he wasn’t sure of his score on one hole. ... The 51 players completing 54 holes averaged 71.71 strokes on the par 71 Royal Fox layout in the final round, with 11 players in the 60s and 21 under par.

– Tim Cronin