Ben Hogan semifinalists named

Chesapeake Energy, in association with Colonial CC, The Friends of Golf (FOG) and the Golf Coaches Association of America, released the names of the 10 semifinalists for the 2009 Ben Hogan Award today.

Jorge Campillo, Indiana

Bud Cauley, Alabama

Rickie Fowler, Oklahoma State

Matthew Giles, USC

Morgan Hoffmann, Oklahoma State

Billy Horschel, Florida

Kyle Stanley, Clemson

Nick Taylor, Washington

Cameron Tringale, Georgia Tech

Mike Van Sickle, Marquette

In the interest of full disclosure I'm a voting member of the selection committee. The list was a bit different from the one I had on my ballot. Instead of Fowler, Giles and Horschel, I had N.C. State's Matt Hill, Oklahoma State's Trent Leon and Georgia's Adam Mitchell. In my reasoning, winning a tournament with other strong finishes (and maybe a couple so-so starts) outranked consistently high finishes but no victories. Hill has won four college events, and Mitchell won the Porter Cup last summer along with reaching the semifinals of the U.S. Amateur.

The only gripe I think people can have with the semifinalist list is the omission of Hill, who has a 70.02 stroke average and three other top-10 finishes to go with his wins. Conversely, his head-to-head record versus the 10 that did make the list is 4-8-2 and his ranking in the Scratch Players World Amateur ranking is only 61st.