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The No. 1 men's team entering 2011-12 is ...

Wednesday, August 31, 2011 Comments
Fans in Westwood will be happy to see that UCLA is the No. 1 ranked team in the Golf World/Nike Golf preseason Division I coaches' poll.

Men's D-I top 25 Sept. 5.jpgMen's D-I also receiving votes Sept. 5.jpg
The Bruins earned eight of the 19 available first-place votes after finishing first in the stroke-play portion of the 2011 NCAA Championship. This is the second time in four seasons that coach Derek Freeman's team has started the fall as the No. 1 ranked team, the other being at the beginning of the 2008-09 campaign.


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Final thoughts from Erin Hills

Tuesday, August 30, 2011 Comments
KraftTrophy.jpgGATE B9, CINCINNATI AIRPORT--What's the old cliche, "that's why they play the game?" It would appear to be a fitting one given the outcome of Sunday's final at the U.S. Amateur Championship.

I couldn't find anyone over the weekend who didn't think that Patrick Cantlay would be the last man standing on Sunday at Erin Hills GC. It wasn't any disrespect to eventual champion Kelly Kraft or the other semifinalists, Jordan Russell and Jack Senior. It was just that the 19-year-old UCLA All-American had been playing so well for so long this summer that it seemed as if it was his destiny to hold the Havemeyer Trophy.

How else do you explain the amazing comeback against Russell Henley in their second-round match? And the similarly impressive rally against Max Buckley in the quarterfinals?

What made Sunday's result so interesting was to see Cantlay, a young man who ordinarily shows the poise and maturity of a PGA Tour veteran, suffer from highly uncharacteristic mistakes that cost him the victory. Read more
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Kraft 2 up on Cantlay after morning 18

Sunday, August 28, 2011 Comments
ERIN, Wis.—Does Patrick Cantlay have another comeback in him?

That's what it's going to require if the top-ranked amateur in the country wants to beat Kelly Kraft and cap off an impressive summer by claiming the U.S. Amateur title this afternoon at Erin Hills GC after Kraft took a 2-up lead during the opening 18 holes.

Kraft, a 21-year-old from Denton, Texas, who finished up his college eligibility at SMU in the spring, looked poised through most of the morning round, making the equivalent of just one bogey and four birdies (with match-play concessions) through the first 17 holes. Conversely, Cantlay, a rising sophomore from UCLA who had four top-25 finishes in PGA Tour events this summer, struggled a bit off the tee, hitting just eight of 14 fairways.

Kraft's lead was as large as 4 up when on the par-3 16th hole Cantlay hit his tee shot into a greenside bunker and then failed to get his second shot out of the sand. Before Cantlay hit his third shot his caddie began raking the bunker. Believing that was a penalty, Cantlay conceded Kraft's birdie (his tee shot was eight feet from the hole). Jim Hyler, president of the USGA and the rules official for the match, informed Cantlay it wasn't a penalty but Kraft won the hole because Cantlay had already conceded the birdie.

Cantlay bounced back from the lapse, however, rolling in a 60-foot birdie putt through 10 feet of fringe to win the 17th hole. He then hung on to win a wild 18th hole with a bogey when Kraft had his biggest hiccup of the morning, making a triple-bogey 8 after a wayward tee shot, a third shot into a bunker and more struggles around the green.  

Twice this week Cantlay have been 2 down with two holes to play, only to rally and win the 17th and 18th and then close out the matches in extra holes.
 
There was a new rooting section for Kraft in the Sunday gallery. A half dozen members of the SMU golf team flew up from Dallas Saturday night and greeted their former teammate on the first tee. Throughout the round, the Mustangs shouted words of encouragement.

The afternoon portion of the 36-hole final is scheduled to begin at 1:30 p.m. Central time.
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Cantlay, Kraft set to say hello in U.S. Amateur final

Saturday, August 27, 2011 Comments
Kraft.jpgERIN, Wis.—Patrick Cantlay and Kelly Kraft have never played in the same pairing in a golf tournament. Come Sunday at Erin Hills GC, they'll be together in one of the biggest rounds of their young golf lives.

Cantlay's 4-and-3 victory over Jordan Russell and Kraft's 3-and-1 triumph against Jack Senior during Saturday's semifinals action at the 111th U.S. Amateur sets up the 36-hole finale between a rising UCLA sophomore who has captured the golf world's attention this summer and a SMU golfer (above) who wrapped up his college career this spring and was hoping he could capture the attention of somebody at the USGA this summer, preferably a person on the Walker Cup selection committee.

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And then there were four at the U.S. Amateur

Friday, August 26, 2011 Comments
Jordan_Russell.jpgERIN, Wis.—Saturday's U.S. Amateur semifinals potentially could have had the country's two best college golfers facing off in one match and the two best graduating high school seniors squaring off in the other. Yet Friday afternoon's quarterfinal matches at Erin Hills GC didn't go by the script, a testament to the fact that pedigree alone doesn't get you a victory in match play.

So it is that Jordan Russell (above), a Texas A&M senior who had to all but beg to be allowed to walk on the team three years ago, knocked off defending champion Peter Uihlein, 2 and 1.

Photo by J.D. Cuban

And Jack Senior, a member of the Great Britain & Ireland Walker Cup team who had never previously played in the U.S., beat Texas freshman-to-be Jordan Spieth, 1 up.

And Kelly Kraft, a graduating senior at SMU who played one of the craziest summer schedules you could imagine in hopes of possibly turning the head of the USGA Walker Cup selection committee, took down Patrick Rodgers, 6 and 4.

Only Patrick Cantlay, the country's top-ranked amateur, managed to hold form—barely. As was the case in the second round against Russell Henley, Cantlay was 2 down with two holes to play in the quarterfinals against Max Buckley, an SMU sophomore who spent the summer interning on the equity trading desk for Oppenheimer & Co., on Wall Street. But a three-putt bogey by Buckley on the 17th hole and a birdie by Cantlay on 18 sent the match to extra holes, where a par by the UCLA sophomore closed out the match and let him return to the semifinals for the second straight year.

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Walker Cup wait for Peterson, Langley

Friday, August 26, 2011 Comments
ERIN, Wis.—John Peterson and Scott Langley have spent an entire summer waiting for a call from the USGA telling them they'd earned a spot on the 2011 U.S. Walker Cup team. The next two days, however, might be tougher than the last two months after each was knocked out in the third round of the 111th U.S. Amateur Friday morning. With no more holes to play, they'll both have to hope they've proven themselves worth of a pick.

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The $600,000 match at Erin Hills

Thursday, August 25, 2011 Comments
PatCantlay1.jpgERIE, Wis.—They played the $600,000 match at Erin Hills GC Thursday afternoon during the second round of the U.S. Amateur. Somehow, it lived up to its big-money label.

After five hours of tension-filled, "can-you-believe-that" action, Patrick Cantlay calmly rolled in a four-footer for par to put away Russell Henley on the 21st hole, making sure his rally from a 2-down deficit with two holes remaining did not go for naught.  

With their impressive performances in various professional tournaments this year, Cantlay (right) and Henley would have combined to earn a little more than that six-figure sum if they were not playing as amateurs. Cantlay had made the cut in four PGA Tour starts (all top-25 finishes, including a top 10 at the RBC Canadian Open). Henley won a Nationwide Tour event and played on the weekend for the second straight year at the U.S. Open.

Through the (un)luck of the draw, the future U.S. Walker Cup teammates, though, were forced to play each other early in the USGA's oldest championship. To say it was one of the best match in the 116-year history of the competition would be hyperbole, but it was certainly entertaining.

Photo by J.D. Cuban
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No. 64 suits Leopold just fine

Thursday, August 25, 2011 Comments
BobbyLeopold2.jpgERIN, Wis.—To say that Bobby Leopold won one for the old guys Thursday morning at Erin HIlls GC might be a bit of a stretch. He is, after all, just 26, a long way away from receiving an AARP card.

Still when a golfer who isn't straight out of college/high school—and actually works for a living—reaches the round of 32 at the U.S. Amateur these days, it officially qualifies as newsworthy.

Particularly, too, when said he takes out the tournament medalist.

Photo by J.D. Cuban


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A little bit of the unusual at Erin Hills

Wednesday, August 24, 2011 Comments
ERIN, Wis.—A little bit of everything seemed to take place Wednesday at Erin Hills, in a slightly twisted sort of way.

Fog delay? Check.

USGA scoring record? Check.

Two-hour, 20-man, three-hole playoff? Check.

6:54 p.m. starting time? Check.

Conclusion to the first round of match play at Erin Hills GC? Not quite.

Of course that was the one thing that USGA officials were probably truly hoping for in an effort to get the championship back on schedule after Tuesday morning rains prevented an on-time conclusion to stroke-play qualifying. Read more
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Main claims U.S. Amateur medalist honors

Wednesday, August 24, 2011 Comments
ERIN, Wis.—Early Wednesday afternoon, there were plenty of players huddled around the scoreboard at Erin Hills GC, anxiously waiting to see whether their scores would get them into or leave them out of match play at the 111th U.S. Amateur Championship.

Gregor Main, however, wasn't one of them.

The 22-year-old from Danville, Calif., had allowed himself the luxury of not having to sweat anything out when earlier in the day he played the final nine holes of his second round of stroke-play qualifying at Erin Hills in three under par. It gave Main a 67 for the entire round and a 10-under 132 total for 36 holes, earning him not only medalist honors but also a place in the USGA record book to matching the lowest score by a medalist in the championships history (he tied the achievement of Hank Kim in 1994 at TPC Sawgrass).
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