NorCal well represented at 125th USGA U.S. Amateur Championship

If home field advantage carries any weight in a major golf event, the winner of this week’s USGA U.S. Amateur Championship, being played at the Olympic Club in San Francisco, August 11 – 17, may well come from the ranks of the fourteen Northern Californians in the field.

The local players hail from all around the Bay Area and the inland regions of the northern half of the state, from as far south as Salinas and as far north as Red Bluff. For one local player in the field the 2025 U.S. Amateur is an actual home game – Matthew Goode, of San Francisco, is not only a member of the Olympic Club, he is the current club champion. There is one more player with a connection to the Bay Area – World #1 Amateur Jackson Koivun, who was born and raised in San Jose, attended Laurel Springs High School in Ojai, California, but now, along with his parents, calls Chapel Hill, North Carolina, home since starting college at Auburn University.

Jackson Koivun plays his tee shot on the 16th hole during the first round of stroke play of the 2025 U.S. Amateur at The Olympic Club (Ocean Course) in San Francisco, Calif. on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025. (Eakin Howard/USGA)

The NorCal field ranges in age from Aston Lim, of Union City, at 15, to recent college graduates Matthew Kress of Saratoga, and Baron Szeto, of Moraga, both 22 years of age.

Overall the ages of the players in the field range from Lim, at 15 to Arizona resident Greg Sanders, 61. The oldest winner in the 124-year history of the event is Jack Westland, 47, in 1952; the youngest is Byeong-hun (Ben) An, who played one year of college golf at Cal-Berkeley – 2010-2011; An took the title in 2009, at age 17. The average age of the players in the field this year is 23, so this championship is definitely the province of young, but experienced, players.

The tournament opens with two rounds of stroke play on the Lake and Ocean courses at the Olympic Club on Monday and Tuesday to trim the field from 312 hopefuls to the match play field of 64. The field will be further whittled down over four days of match play, Wednesday through Saturday, with the two finalists contesting for the championship in a 36-hole final on Sunday, August 17th.

Getting to the first tee box at the U.S. Amateur is an epic journey in itself. To even enter a qualifying event a player must have a handicap of 0.4 or better. This year 5,245 players submitted entries, most of whom teed it up at 47 local qualifying sites hoping to advance to final qualifying at one of 19 sites, and from there to the U.S. Amateur. Various achievements in amateur golf during the year leading up to this tournament will earn a player a direct entry to the event, and six of the 143 exempt entrants are from Northern California:

• Jackson Koivun (San Jose) – Qualified for 2025 U.S. Open; Top 20 points leaders in the World Amateur Golf Ranking as of March 26; Top 100 points leaders in the World Amateur Golf Ranking as of May 21
• Jaden Dumdumaya (Benicia) – Winner of 2025 Pacific Coast Amateur
• Jacob Goode (San Francisco) – Winner of 2025 California Amateur
• Matthew Kress (Saratoga) – Top 100 points leaders in the World Amateur Golf Ranking as of June 25
• Zachery Pollo (Rocklin) – Qualified for 2025 U.S. Open; Top 100 points leaders in the World Amateur Golf Ranking as of May 21
• Clark Van Gaalen (Turlock) – Top 100 points leaders in the World Amateur Golf Ranking as of June 25

At the end of 18 holes of stroke play Jackson Koivun led the NorCal contingent, sitting T5 at 2-under. Koivun is the only local player who is currently under par for the tournament, but a handful look to be in with a chance to advance to match play if they carry on Tuesday as they began today. That group includes the youngest player in the field, Aston Lim; the 15-year-old shot a one-over-par 71 on the Lake Course today, as did Baron Szeto of Moraga; Avinash Iyer of San Ramon – a SJSU Men’s Golf team member; Sacramento’s Brady Siravo; and Clark Van Gaalen. Also currently within the Top 64 are Zachery Pollo of Rocklin and Jaden Dumdumaya, of Benicia.

Play resumes Tuesday morning at 7:00 a.m., with players switching from Lake to Ocean courses, or vice versa. Ties for 64th position at the end of stroke play on Tuesday will be decided by a playoff.

Lexi Thompson’s 2021 U.S. Women’s Open – a tale of two nines

The golf weather gods gave with one hand and took away with the other for today’s final round of the U.S. Women’s Open. The foggy, damp conditions of the previous three days were just a memory as Friday morning dawned sunny and bright—with brisk, blustery winds but otherwise picture-perfect conditions as the final pairing of the day— leader Lexi Thompson; Yuka Sosa, 19, of the Phillipines; and the Low Amateur leader, 17-year-old Megha Ganne—stepped up to the first tee.

Lexi Thompson hits her tee shot on the 12th hole during the final round at the 2021 U.S. Women's Open at The Olympic Club in San Francisco, Calif. on Sunday, June 6, 2021. (Darren Carroll/USGA)

As the pair of young, talented teenagers with whom she was paired struggled early in the round, Lexi Thompson, a veteran of 14 U.S. Women’s Opens and 36 other major championships, started out strong with a birdie on the par-5 first hole, then stuttering slightly with a bogey on #2. She made up the lost stroke with a birdie on five that was set up by a slingshot from the right rough that caught a good slope and rolled to near kick-in range.

Throughout the front nine Thompson looked cool, confident, and in command of her game, but on the second nine she resembled nothing so much as a front-running race car that was down on power, leaking oil, and struggling to hang on to an early lead.

That apparent command of her game started to drift away on the 11th hole. A wayward drive led to a hard chop out of the left rough that fell short, and was in turn followed by a duffed chip shot that came up short of the green, and a dead-push bogey putt. It was Thompson’s worst hole of the day, a double-bogey six that halved her (then) lead over China’s Shanshan Feng.

Not that her command of her game had totally left her—apparently unfazed by a flyer out of the right rough on #12 that raced through the green and over the back side, she rolled a long-range masterpiece of a putt to kick-in distance to save par.

After a fairly routine par on the par-three 13th hole, more trouble in the deep rough left of the 14th fairway left Thompson chipping on for her third and leaving nearly 16 feet for par—a putt that was spot-on for distance but misread for line by nearly a foot. The resulting bogey cut her lead, once again, to two strokes, now over the trio of Megan Khang, Nasa Hataoka, and Shanshan Feng.

On 15, with room to shoot at a back-center flag, Thompson played short, leaving herself 51 feet for a desperately needed birdie that, true to recent form, she didn’t get.

In the meantime, Thompson’s playing partner Yuka Saso had righted the ship after her par-double-double start, putting up four pars and a birdie to close out her front nine with a 3-over 38. Saso stumbled slightly at 11 with a bogey, but eventually closed strong with birdies on 16 and 17 to finish regulation play, and narrowly missed a potential tournament-winning putt at 18, to finish at four under.

Also moving up fast on the inside was Japan’s Nasa Hataoka, who put up six birdies against a double and a bogey to post 34-34–68, catching up to Thompson at four under as the Floridian approached the final hole.

The death knell for Thompson’s hopes of a 15th-time-lucky U.S. Women’s Open win was her second shot at the par-four 18th hole. From a good lie on the right-hand side of the fairway, she chili-dipped her approach into the deep, bowl-shaped right-front bunker. From a good lie on flat, groomed sand she overshot the tight-front flag, leaving herself a slippery, downhill 11-foot putt that she had to make to join Saso and Hataoka in a playoff.

She missed.

That putt was the climax to the latest in a long line of close calls and missed opportunities for Thompson, whose major championship record now includes three second-place finishes, four third-place finishes, 11 Top-5s, and 17 Top-10s. A certain five-letter word that starts with “c” is being thrown around in the commentary surrounding Lexi Thompson’s performance in this Women’s Open, and being as charitable as possible, it is still hard to argue with.

And those two young, talented teenagers that comprised the rest of Lexi Thompson’s group? Megha Ganne gamed up with a string of pars and one last bogey after a front-nine 41, making a got-to-have-it birdie at #17 to clinch Low Amateur honors. Yuka Saso went on to defeat Nasa Hataoka on the third hole of a playoff, stiffing her approach shot on their second time through #9 and sinking the birdie putt for the win. With this week’s effort she has made history as the first Filipino major champion in golf, and has exactly equaled Inbee Park’s age as youngest U.S. Women’s Open winner from her 2008 win in this event: 19 years, 11 months, 17 days.

Good going, ladies.

Friday – Cut Day at the U.S. Women’s Open

For most folks Friday is a day to celebrate. The weekend is almost here, and we are looking forward to knocking off of work and having a couple of days to relax and have fun—maybe play some golf. For tournament golfers, though, Friday has an entirely different meaning—Friday is Cut Day.

They call Saturday “Moving Day”, the day when players put the pedal to the metal and try to move up the scoreboard to be in position to make a run at a win on Sunday, but to get to Moving Day you have to get past Cut Day.

While we recreational golfers pay to play, the pros play to get paid, and Friday is when it gets real. The field in most professional events—and USGA championships, too, though there are amateurs in the field—is around 150 to 156 players, and less than half of them get to play the weekend for a chance at a trophy and a paycheck (or just the trophy, in the case of the amateurs).

Friday is the day when you sink or swim. If you had a bad day on Thursday, in the first round, you had better step up on Friday; if you rocked the house in the first round, you better keep it up and stay in that Top-60-and-ties group.

Missing the cut was known as “trunk slamming” back in the days when Tour pros drove from tournament to tournament. I guess now they just slam the tailgate of the SUV courtesy car before they head to the airport—but it just doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it?

Who made a move today?

There were few big moves on Cut Day at the Olympic Club for the 76th U.S. Women’s Open—mostly just a lot of hanging on grimly to a position above the cut line.

Less than half of the players who occupied the top 20 spots on the leaderboard after the second round improved their scores from Thursday to Friday, and with few exceptions they improved, if at all, by one or two strokes.

Sarah Burnham, a second-year pro out of Michigan State, orchestrated a ten-stroke turnaround. After carding a 5-over 76 in the first round she came back and hammered out a 5-under 66 in the second. She turned her first round birdie/bogey of 1/6 count on its head, carding six birdies against one bogey and turning a T-84 and a likely missed cut into T-12 and playing on the weekend.

A little outside the Top 20, NorCal player Yealimi Noh, the winner of the 2018 U.S. Girls’ Junior at the NCGA’s home course, Poppy Hills, also made a dramatic move, as she went from a 5-over 76 in the first round to a 2-under 69 in the second. 

Noh’s seven-stroke turnaround came on the strength of five birdies against a bogey and a double, as opposed to her first-round count of three birdies against six bogeys and a double, floating her fifty-five spots up the leaderboard from T-84 to T-29.

San Francisco-born Danielle Kang made a four-stroke improvement from Round 1 to Round 2, obviously carrying no scar tissue from a triple-bogey 8—yes, the dreaded snowman—on the long par-five 16th hole in Round 1.

How did the rest of the NorCal players fare?

Between Danielle Kang at T-12 and Yealimi No at T-29, two more NorCal players made the cut. Lucy Li, the one-time girl wonder who qualified for the 2014 U.S. Women’s Open at age 11, posted 73-71–144 for T-20, tied with Monterey native daughter Mina Harigae with 71-72–144.

Harigae, whose round I followed today, missed a much higher finish by a cumulative 18 inches or so, based on the number of close-call putts that just didn’t drop for her today. If she figures out the mysteries of the Lake Course’s greens over the weekend she could well be a contender for the title.

In other news…

In other second-round news, anyone who was waiting for the Megha Ganne bubble to burst was disappointed. The 17-year-old amateur, whose biggest success previous to this event was in Augusta National’s Drive, Pitch, and Putt competitions, matched three bogeys with three birdies to card an even-par 71 and hold on to her 4-under score. She was dropped out of her co-leading position when Yuka Saso of the Phillippines added a second-round 67 to her first round 69 to take over the lead, and Korea’s Jeongeun Lee6 moved to 5-under and solo second after posting 70-67–137.

Ganne shares third place with Megan Khang, an LPGA pro since 2016. Khang, of Rockland, Massachusetts, can call on a familiarity with the local conditions based on having played in the 2012 U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship, which was held at nearby Lake Merced Golf Club.

Reid and a surprise player hold co-lead after Day One of 2021 U.S. Women’s Open

When the men last played the national championship at the Olympic Club, in 2012, some British golf fans took umbrage at the USGA’s course setup, claiming that the event was “spoiled” by a course setup “designed to expose stars” and “humiliate our heroes”. Well, I hope those same blokes were watching the first round of the 2021 U.S. Women’s Open from the Olympic Club, because one of the UK’s finest distaff players, Mel Reid, showed the fellas how it should be done.

Reid posted a 4-under 67 on the par 71 setup, with five birdies and a lone bogey on the par-4 eighteenth hole spoiling the fun, taking only 28 putts on greens which were running at 12 to 12-1/2 today.

Reid was chased down at the last by comes-out-of-nowhere amateur Megha Ganne, who carded 32-25–67 to tie for the lead in the clubhouse, while Canada’s Brooke Henderson sweated ice chips over a slippery 3-foot downhill putt on the 18th hole as the sun set into the Pacific, hoping to close her round as part of a three-way tie for the lead. She missed it, but sank the comebacker back to join the trio of Angel Yin, Megan Khang, and Lexi Thompson at 3-under, one off the lead.

Among the NorCal-affiliated players in the field Mina Harigae’s even-par 71 tops the list, with Lucy Li at +1 right behind. Danielle Kang survived a beating at the par-five 16th, holing out a chip to get away with only a triple-bogey eight, to finish the day at +2, and 2014 U.S. Women’s Open champ and new San Francisco resident Michelle Wie West came in at +4. Amateurs Rachel Heck and Claire Choi joined San José native Christina Kim at +4 on the day.

A quick note from Wednesday at the U.S. Women’s Open

Wednesdays at a golf tournament have a certain feel, a “calm before the storm” quality that is palpable, and never more so than at a USGA championship. All USGA events are special, of course, but the Men’s and Women’s Opens are the crown jewels of the championship season, and it is the 2021 U.S. Women’s Open that I have the pleasure to find myself at this week.

Pulling into the media parking lot today at San Francisco’s Olympic Club, where I have covered a U.S. Open (2012), the inaugural Men’s Four-Ball Championship (2015), and the NCGA’s California Amateur (2017), I could feel the energy in the air even before I got to the entrance gates. Then I walked past the practice green, across the street from the club’s pro shop, and saw dozens of the hopefuls—well-known and practically unknown—who will tee it up in the opening round tomorrow, grinding over their putting, getting a feel for what is, for many of them, a very different environment for golf.

Further up the way and around the curve, at the practice range, players are working on full shots, accustomizing themselves to the dense, cool air a little more than a long par-5 from the crashing Pacific surf. On the course competitors are playing their final practice rounds, learning their way around the slopes and canted, rumpled fairways of one of the most challenging championship venues they will ever play. Belying the name, there are no water hazards on the Lake Course, and only one fairway bunker—on the inside of the slight dogleg-left on hole #6. The angles, uneven lies, and demanding putting surfaces comprise the championship test here at the Olympic Club—and they have tested, and bested, the games of some of the legends of golf—Ben Hogan and Arnold Palmer, just to name two.

Will local knowledge help a NorCal player on their way to a championship this week? Two past U.S. Women’s Open champions with roots in the area are in the field this week: 2010 champ Paula Creamer grew up in Pleasanton, across the bay in the warmer, drier, inland reaches of Alameda County; and Michelle Wie West, a native of Honolulu, Hawaii, who studied at Stanford University while playing on the LPGA Tour, and who now lives in San Francisco. Will her membership and frequent playing time at nearby Lake Merced Golf Club stand her in good stead at the Olympic Club this week?

I’ll be out early on Thursday morning to follow a pair of NorCal competitors who are teeing off at 7:15 a.m. and who represent two extremes of experience in the event: San José native Christina Kim, who is playing in her seventeenth U.S. Women’s Open; and Pleasanton’s Jaclyn LaHa, a rising high school junior who is playing in her first. Kim was co-medalist in her qualifying tournament at Dedham, Massachusetts’s Country Club with a 3-under 137; LaHa placed second at the Marin Country Club qualifier with a 7-under 137 (70–67).

I can hardly wait for it to begin.

Some familiar—and not so familiar—NorCal-affiliated players in the field at this week’s U.S. Women’s Open

San Francisco’s Olympic Club is no stranger to USGA championship golf; the world-renowned golf club that sits between Lake Merced and the Pacific Ocean in the western reaches of the city has hosted five memorable U.S. Opens, two U.S. Amateur tournaments, three U.S. Junior Amateurs, and the inaugural Men’s Fourball Championship, in 2015. This week, though, the club records a first, as it hosts the 2021 U.S. Women’s Open on the challenging Lake Course.

While the field at the second USWO to be played in the Bay Area (the 2016 event was hosted by the CordeValle Resort in San Martin, south of San José) will be replete with world-class players, local fans may be interested in following the play of the even dozen golfers with Northern California connections who are listed below. They range from a high-school-age amateur to experienced professionals with major championship victories to their credit—including two who have hoisted the very trophy which will be awarded to the winner here on Sunday afternoon.

Will one of these twelve women, with their local knowledge and experience of NorCal weather and turf conditions, hoist the Harton S. Semple trophy on Sunday afternoon? 

Claire Choi (a)

Amateur competitor Claire Choi, a native of Honolulu, Hawaii, is a rising senior at Santa Clara University and a graduate of Punahou High School in Honolulu, the alma mater of 2014 USWO champion Michelle Wie West.

Claire qualified for the 2021 USWO, her first, with a 4-over-par 144 at Oahu Country Club on May 10th—the day before her 21st birthday.

Paula Creamer

Pleasanton, CA, native Paula Creamer has been a well-known presence in LPGA fields since 2005, after a junior/amateur career that included 11 AJGA titles, selection to the 2004 Curtis Cup team and low amateur honors in the 2004 U.S. Women’s Open.

Paula took the 2010 USWO title, carding the only under-par total score over 72 holes at Pennsylvania’s Oakmont Country Club. Her USWO record includes 11 straight Top 20 finishes, and five Top 10s, from 2004 to 2014.

Mina Harigae

Monterey’s Mina Harigae made waves early in her golf career, winning the first of four consecutive California Women’s Amateur titles in 2001 at the age of 12. Other highlights of her amateur golf career include semifinalist finishes in the U.S. Girls’ Junior in 2003 and 2006, winning the 2007 Women’s Amateur Public Links at the age of 17, and representing the United States on the 2008 Curtis Cup team.

Mina turned pro after one semester at Duke University and has seven professional victories to her credit: three on the Symetra Tour, and four on the Cactus Tour in Arizona during the LPGA’s COVID-19 hiatus. This is her 11th U.S. Women’s Open appearance.

Rachel Heck

Currently the hottest amateur in the country, Stanford University freshman Rachel Heck took medalist honors at the May 3rd qualifier at Marin Country Club in Novato with an 8-under 136. Last August she was the stroke play medalist at the U.S. Women’s Amateur before being defeated in the Round of 16, and in 2017 was the youngest competitor in the field at the U.S. Women’s Open, finishing T-33.

Danielle Kang

SoCal-raised but born in San Francisco, Danielle Kang is making her 11th start in the U. S Women’s Open this week. Her best finish in the event is a solo 4th at Shoal Creek in 2018, but Kang is no stranger to the podium in USGA competition; she took back-to-back U.S. Women’s Amateur titles in 2010 and 2011.

Christina Kim

San José native Christina Kim has made 16 previous U.S. Women’s Open appearances, her highest finish being a T-8 in the 2010 event at Oakmont Country Club. She has one USGA championship title to her name—the 2001 U.S. Girls’ Junior. Kim has represented the United States on three Solheim Cup teams, and has racked up six Top-10 finishes in major championships, including a tie for third in the 2009 Women’s British Open.

Jaclyn LaHa (a)

Another Pleasanton native, Jaclyn LaHa, a 16-year-old rising high school junior, is the second-youngest competitor in the field of the 2021 U.S. Women’s Open. LaHa shot a 7-under 137, including a 5-under 67 in the afternoon round, at Marin Country Club in Novato to take the second and final qualifying spot from that event.

Lucy Li

Making her third U.S. Women’s Open appearance this week, 18-year-old Lucy Li, of Redwood Shores, played in her first in 2014 at Pinehurst Resort and Country Club. Li set a record for the youngest competitor in the history of the event at 11 years, 8 months, and 19 days, but shot a pair of 78s to miss the cut.

Other notable “youngest competitor” marks she has set include youngest match-play qualifier in U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links history at 10 years, 8 months, 16 days in 2013, and youngest U.S. Women’s Amateur qualifier (10 years, 10 months, 4 days), also in 2013. Li played on the winning 2018 United States Curtis Cup team, and took medalist honors that same year in the U.S. Girls’ Junior and U.S. Women’s Amateur.

Yealimi Noh

Another native of the East Bay, Concord’s Yealimi Noh is making her second U.S. Women’s Open appearance. She contended for three rounds in last year’s late-season Open in December at Champions Club in Houston, Texas, but slipped to a tie for 40th after a final-round 80.

Noh is one of six Northern California natives to claim the U.S. Girls’ Junior title, at Poppy Hills in 2018, joining Pat Hurst (1986), Jamille José (1988), Dorothy Delasin (1996,) Lisa Ferrero (2000), and Christina Kim (2001) in that honor.

Kathleen Scavo

Benicia’s Kathleen Scavo joins the field for the 2021 U.S. Women’s Open on the strength of a medal-winning 1-over 143 in the April 26 qualifier at Half Moon Bay Golf Links.

This is the second U.S. Women’s Open appearance for Scavo, a graduate of the University of Oregon; she qualified for the 2014 event but missed the cut on the challenging Pinehurst #2 course. Her resulyts in previous USGA championships include advancing to the quarterfinals of the 2013 U.S. Girls’ Junior, and advancing to the round of 16 in the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball at Bandon Dunes, Oregon, with partner Lucy Li.

Michelle Wie West

A native of Hawaii who graduated from Stanford University and who now resides in San Francisco with husband Jonnie West and daughter Makenna, Michelle Wie West needs no introduction to golf fans.

A prodigy who qualified for the U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links at age 10, Wie West became the championship’s youngest winner at age 13, She showed showed major championship mettle in the 2003 Kraft-Nabisco Championship (now the ANA Inspiration), becoming the youngest player to make the cut, and playing in the final group on Sunday after a blistering 66 the previous day.

Wie West’s U.S. Women’s Open record over 15 appearances is a checkered one—it includes a win, in 2014 at Pinehurst; a T-3 finish in 2006 at Newport Country Club; a T-10 in 2018 at Shoal Creek; four MCs; and two WDs due to injury.

Rose Zhang

Set to join the Stanford Women’s Golf team in the fall of 2021, Irvine, California, native Rose Zhang is making her third U.S. Women’s Open start this week. Zhang is the reigning U.S. Women’s Amateur champion, and took low amateur honors at this year’s ANA Inspiration.

Golf in the Bay Area: the future’s so bright, we gotta wear shades

In golf as well in other matters, I am an unabashed, unashamed Bay Area/Monterey Peninsula chauvinist. The weather and the geography of the region create an environment for the game that is virtually unequaled anywhere else in the world—as a result, we enjoy the privilege of a disproportionate number of world-class events to enjoy when we are not playing golf ourselves, and that includes the game’s majors.

The highly successful 2019 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach refreshed the region’s reputation as a premium site for golf’s biggest events, and the lineup of big-time tournaments that is coming to Northern California in the next few years illustrates the confidence that the game’s governing bodies have in our area as a golf destination.

Big events return as early as next year, when the 2020 PGA Championship comes to TPC Harding Park in San Francisco. Arguably one of the finest municipal courses in the country, the across-the-lake neighbor to the famed Olympic Club is no stranger to big events, having hosted the Schwab Cup Championship in 2013 and the 2009 Presidents Cup.

And speaking of the Olympic Club, the 5-time U.S. Open venue will host its first U.S. Women’s Open in 2021; two years later the USGA’s ultimate distaff championship will makes its first appearance at Pebble Beach Golf Links.

The year 2025 will see two big-time amateur events in the region. The U.S. Amateur will return to the Olympic Club after an 18-year hiatus, and maybe even more exciting, the Walker Cup—probably the premier men’s amateur event in the world, pitting the best amateur men in the U.S against a team of amateur standouts from Great Britain and Ireland—will be played at Cypress Point, the legendary Monterey Peninsula venue that was once part of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am rota. The opportunity to walk those hallowed Alister-Mackenzie-designed fairways is not to be missed.

The major-event calendar comes full-circle in 2027, when the U.S. Open returns to Pebble Beach, marking the Del Monte Forest venue’s seventh time hosting the national championship. Pebble will then be tied with Baltusrol Golf Club, in New Jersey, for second place in host-club status, behind Pennsylvania’s Oakmont Country Club, which will host its record-breaking tenth U.S. Open in 2025.

And finally, as far into the future as the crystal ball can see, in 2028—when I will need a hovercraft-style floating chair to get me around the course—the PGA Championship will return to the Bay Area, alighting across Lake Merced at the Olympic Club for the first time.

Three share the lead after first round of LPGA Mediheal Championship at Lake Merced GC

The former GM of Lake Merced Golf Club, Donna Lowe, used to remind me to dress in layers when she knew I was coming up from the South Bay for a tournament or a media event at the club. This is tribal knowledge to a native of the Bay Area, a given when visiting San Francisco, and it is especially true in the area around Lake Merced—golf’s golden circle in San Francisco, home to Lake Merced Golf Club, the Olympic Club, TPC Harding Park, and San Francisco Golf Club. I like to tell people that I have experienced three seasons in a day on a summer’s day here, and none of them was summer.

That being said, Thursday at the LPGA Mediheal Championship was the kind of day that almost justifies the area’s sky-high property values: clear blue sky, light breezes, and temperatures that had me leaving my jacket in the media center. Lake Merced is a joy to walk on a day like today was. A tree-pruning program undertaken in recent years has left the course with fairways that are well-defined by lines of weathered and wind-knotted cypress and pines, while at the same time leaving an open, airy feel with great visibility from hole to hole, and open, sunlit greens.

Thursday was a day when many of the bigger names were lying low, with two-time major winner So Yeon Ryu (2011 U.S. Women’s Open, 2017 ANA Inspiration) being the most recognizable name in the Top Ten through the morning rounds.

Catching early-round leaders can be difficult at Lake Merced. The ubiquitous afternoon breeze is a chilly onshore waft that turns approach shots on east-facing holes into knuckleballs, and knocks down west-running shots short of the green, making a come-from-behind effort a tough proposition.

Of course, tough does not mean impossible, as was demonstrated by the Netherland’s Anne Van Dam, who overcame two bogeys in the first four holes to turn in two-under 34 after birdies at holes 5 and 9, and an eagle at the par-4 eighth hole. She continued her run on the second nine with a birdie on the 14th hole, and closing back-to-back birdies on 17 and 18 for a five-under 67 and a share of the lead. This is the Dutch player’s first lead after any round in an LPGA Tour event.

While the top of the leaderboard was lacking in the more-familiar names, it did display the international flavor that characterizes the LPGA Tour, with nine countries represented among the top twelve players.

Among players with a Northern California connection, former Stanford Women’s Golf standout Mariah Stackhouse posted an even-par 72 and sits at T-23 after the first round. Monterey’s Mina Harigae carded a three-over 75 for T-88. Pleasanton’s Paula Creamer closed with a bogey six, after pulling her tee shot into tree trouble on #18 and rifling a low-running second shot over the back side of the green, for a four-over 76, and San Jose native Christina Kim, whose record for becoming the youngest player to reach $1 million in earnings (in 2004) was broken by Paula Creamer the following year, had a rough day on the course, carding eight-over 80.

The weather forecast for tomorrow’s second round is for continued sunny, and slightly warmer temperatures—another great day for golf.

Dan Jenkins and Me

Dan Jenkins, one of the finest American sportswriters in history, and arguably the finest ever to write about golf, died Thursday, March 7, 2019. He was 90 years old.

In the days following his death, better-known and more-accomplished writers than myself have written, and will be writing, about Jenkins and what his work and career meant to them. Among them there may be other besides me who can make this statement:

Dan Jenkins is the reason I became a golf writer.

I might have run across one or two of Danֹ’s golf columns in Playboy in the mid ’80s, thumbing through the pages of the magazine on the way to perusing the photos of the “shapely adorables” (as Dan would have called them), but I first fell in love with his work in 1987, when I read his golf novel Dead Solid Perfect. The father of the young lady I was dating at the time recommended the book to me, footnoting his recommendation with this piece of advice: “Don’t read it anyplace where laughing out loud will bother other people.” I picked up a copy, read it straight through over a weekend, and was hooked.

Though I was born and raised in Salinas, California, I flatter myself that I have a connection, at two removes, to the part of the world that shaped Dan—a native of Fort Worth, Texas—in early life. My paternal grandfather was born in nearby Krum, Texas, growing up there before moving to Oklahoma, where both of my parents were born. And while some of my attitudes and beliefs would probably have struck Dan as a little liberal and “PC”, as a “CIO” (California-Improved Okie), in many ways I can relate to the point of view of a native Texan like Dan.

Prior to reading Dead Solid Perfect my sole exposure to golf had been one round with some 8th-grade friends on the local nine-hole muni in Salinas, and a few P.E. classes in high school—from which I took away a decent understanding of the Vardon Grip and little else. Even after falling under the thrall of Jenkins’ words, reading and re-reading his fiction and non-fiction books, it was years before I picked up golf clubs again. I was knee-deep in an engineering career; had embarked upon what is, to date, a 29-years-and-counting marriage (to a different young lady…); bought a house; started a family—all the usual things.

Most important of all was the fact that I didn’t know anybody who played golf, so I hesitated to take it up with serious intent (and am still shy about inflicting my game on strangers.) So, my investment in the game stalled out at reading about it, and watching the occasional tournament on TV. For years then, while I probably had more golf trivia at my fingertips (from reading Jenkins’ work) than most people who actually played the game, I had no one to talk to about golf, to share my interest with. As an outlet for that interest, which all started with Dead Solid Perfect, I started this blog.

On February 2, 2011 I posted the first, introductory column on Will o'the Glen on Golf, wherein I wrote:

I have only been playing golf with any level of intent for about a year and a half, so I am relatively new to the game, but I have been reading about and following golf for nearly 25 years, having gotten that bug when the father of a friend of mine recommended that I read Dan Jenkins’ book Dead Solid Perfect. I quickly set about getting hold of as many of Mr. Jenkins’ books as I could track down (golf-related and otherwise), and have read everything new that he has come out with since then. Mr Jenkins’ writing, and viewpoint, set the tone for my own viewpoint on the game of golf, so expect to hear a lot about Dan and his golf writing, and Ben Hogan—the mid-20th century golf legend who Mr Jenkins was privileged to know, and whose career he covered from 1951 until Ben’s retirement from competitive golf in 1967.

Jenkins and Hogan have been with me ever since. After an initial two columns about the 2011 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am (“Crosby Weather”, and “Cinderella Story”), I took it upon myself to pen a story about Ben Hogan and his record at Riviera Country Club (the event there followed the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am at the time): “Hogan’s Alley — Riviera Country Club and Bantam Ben”. I continued to read, and review, every book by Dan Jenkins, or about Ben Hogan, that I could find.

In 2012 I responded to an ad on the Monster.com jobs web-page for an events website called Examiner.com, applying for a part-time, freelance position as a writer covering golf for the San Francisco Bay Area and Monterey Peninsula. I was accepted, and with the legitimacy conferred upon me by being affiliated with a recognized media outlet, in June of that year I found myself in possession of a media credential for the 112th United States Open golf tournament at the Olympic Club, in San Francisco.

I was 55 years old, with 30 years’ of experience as a mechanical engineer, but in the world of golf writing I was a wet-behind-the-ears newbie. I was a little star-struck as I walked into the huge media-center tent and looked around, spotting a double-handful of golf writers whose work I had been reading for years—and more so when I spotted Dan Jenkins himself, three rows up and half a dozen seats to the left of my work station in the cheap seats in the back row.

It never occurred to me to walk up and introduce myself to him—I was afraid of tripping over my tongue and looking like a fool in front of the man whose work I revered above all others in the field. 

I did have a face-to-face encounter with Dan during the Open—accidentally. Walking up the steps to the fancy portable restrooms that had been installed next to the media center tent, Dan stepped out of the door just as I reached the landing. A quick recollection of the story of Ben Crenshaw’s first time meeting Jack Nicklaus—in the bathroom of the men’s locker room at Merion—flashed through my mind, so I just stepped back out of his way with a muttered “Excuse me”, clearing the way so he could walk down the steps.

****************************************************************

As melancholy as the news of Dan’s death made me, there was a glimmer of brightness in the column written by his daughter Sally Jenkins—a supremely talented sportswriter in her own right—about her father, in which she stated, “A new manuscript of a novel my father just finished is still open on his desk[…]. The novel, titled The Reunion At Herb’s Café, tells readers where his major fictional characters ended up.”

Dan’s words have made me think and have made me laugh as over the years I read and re-read my collection of his books, and delved into the Sports Illustrated “Vault” online archive—a wonderful resource—to read past articles of his that reside there.

His body of work—a treasure trove of sharply etched observations and finely tuned sentences, all delivered in take-no-prisoners style by a man who saw the humor, and the humanity, in sports and in life—has inspired me for years, and I expect it to continue to do so for many years to come.

San Jose’s Shintaro Ban clinches U.S. Open berth

June 4 is not yet the longest day of 2018 in astronomical terms, but in the world of golf it is. “Golf’s Longest Day” – the day when 36-hole sectional qualifying tournaments for the USGA’s premier golf championship event, the United States Open, are held in ten U.S. locations and two more overseas.

Shintaro Ban, of San Jose, steps in to retrieve his ball after making an eagle on the par-five 18th hole at Lake Merced Golf Club in the June 4, 2018 U.S. Open sectional qualifying tournament. The two-foot putt clinched his spot in the field for the 118th United States Open, next week at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, on Long Island. (photo by author)

It falls on the same day every year – the Monday two weeks before Fathers Day – because the week of Fathers Day is traditionally the week of the U.S. Open. These sectional qualifiers are, with few exceptions, the final chance for golfers across the country and the world to earn a berth in the toughest, and arguably the most important, tournament in the game of golf.

The California venue for this final hurdle before the main event alternates between Northern California and Southern California venues, and in 2018, as in other even-numbered years, the event was held in the Bay Area, at the conveniently adjacent courses at Lake Merced Golf Club and across the lake, at the Olympic Club, on their Ocean Course.

Eighty-six players vied for six spots in the field in the 2018 U.S. Open, which is returning to the storied Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, on New York’s Long Island, for the first time since 2004. The field was split between Lake Merced’s par-72 layout, recently the venue for a new LPGA event, the LPGA Mediheal Championship, and the Olympic Club’s par-71 Ocean Course, sister course to the renowned Lake Course, itself a five-time U.S. Open venue. Going off in the morning starting at 7:00 a.m., the players completed 18-hole rounds on one course before taking a lunch break and moving to the other venue to compete another 18-hole round of golf – it’s easy to see why it’s called “The Longest Day in Golf”, right?

At the end of the day, an Arizona State college golfer, rising junior Chun An Yu, of Chinese Taipei, took medalist honors. Yu laid a crisp 6-under 65 on the Olympic Club’s Ocean Course, carding seven birdies and a lone bogey in the morning round. Taking on the Lake Merced course in breezy conditions in the afternoon round, Yu again had a lone bogey against three birdies for a two-under 70, for a total of eight-under 135.

A South Bay golfer makes the grade

San Jose’s Shintaro Ban, a well-known name to South Bay golfers, came in one stroke behind Chun An Yu, posting a seven-under 136.

Ban, a 2014 graduate of Archbishop Mitty High School in San José, also played Olympic in the morning and Lake Merced in the afternoon, knocking down four birdies and an eagle, on the par-4 sixth hole, against two bogeys for a four-under 67 in the morning round.

The eagle came as a surprise to Ban, “(I) had a hundred yards in. There were a couple of people up there, but they didn’t react and I’m like, ‘Aw, it must be close’, and  I walk up and they’re like, ‘Oh, it went in.’ ”

Ban carded another eagle in the afternoon round at Lake Merced, but it didn’t come without some troubles beforehand. “I struggled to make birdies on the front (nine) par-fives, and I really needed to take advantage of the back nine.” The 2018 UNLV grad put himself in a hole briefly in his afternoon round when a pushed drive on the 5th hole, a downhill, left-bending 399-yard par-four, landed him in a gully between the fourth and fifth fairways. His second shot, out of the gully, hit a tree, resulting in a total of four shots to reach the green, and a two-putt double-bogey. A birdie on the par-3 eighth brought him back to even par for the front nine.

Three birdies and two bogeys through seven holes on the back nine had Ban back under par for the afternoon and within range of advancement to the big show – the United States Open – next week on Long Island, but it was his performance on the final hole of the tournament that closed the deal.

The 18th hole at Lake Merced is a scenic, but problematic, par-five. It’s not the hardest hole on the course, but it is the longest, and it is distinguished by a generous helping of elevation change, dropping over 25 feet down to the lowest point in the fairway from the elevated tee box, and climbing more than double that back up to the putting green. With more than 200 yards to the flag after his drive, Ban had to take into account a climb of about 42 feet from his position in the fairway to the the left-front hole position.

“I didn’t expect to hit it to two feet.”

Lake Merced’s number 18 is a tough reach in two, so it was quite an accomplishment for Ban to place his second shot, a 5-iron from 215 yards, to within two feet of the hole. Ban’s approach shot went inside the excellent approach of playing partner Tim Widing, a USF Don who is originally from Sweden, who laid his second shot to about four feet.

Widing missed his eagle putt, a crucial error which led to him missing out on an opportunity to go to Shinnecock – at least directly. His five-under finish tied him with Edward Olson, of Aptos, California, and the two became the 1st and 2nd alternates from this event.

Ban took due care with the short but crucial putt, dropping it into the heart of the hole to close out his day at 7-under and ensure himself of a place  in the field for the 118th U. S Open.

There was a lot riding on those two eagle putts on #18. If Widing’s had dropped and Ban’s hadn’t, there would have been a five-for-four playoff, with Ban, Widing, and eventual T-3 finishers Rhett Rasmussen, of Draper, Utah; Franklin Huang, of Poway, California; and Sung Joon Park, of Irvine, California, returning to the 10th hole to battle it out for the four qualifying spots behind Chun An Yu.

Next year the U.S. Open will return to Pebble Beach Golf Links for the sixth time, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the opening of the world-famous seaside course.

An Evening with a Champion – 1966 U.S. Open Winner Billy Casper at Lake Merced Golf Club

The Lake Course at San Francisco’s Olympic Club has gained a reputation for producing come-from-behind winners whenever it hosts the U.S. Open golf tournament. The first time that the Olympic Club hosted the Open, in 1955, an unheralded municipal course pro from Iowa named Jack Fleck overtook the great Ben Hogan to tie in regulation play, and then defeated Hogan in a playoff the next day. In 1966, Arnold Palmer had a seven-stroke lead over Billy Casper going into the final round. Overly-complacent with such a large lead in hand with nine holes to play, Palmer had pressed too hard on Olympic’s back nine in pursuit of Ben Hogan’s U.S. Open scoring record. Casper made birdies while Palmer made bogies, and once again a leader was overtaken to force a playoff, and the come-from-behind player won. In this instance it was less of an upset than the Fleck vs. Hogan battle eleven years earlier – Casper had twenty-nine wins to his credit at that point, including the 1959 U.S. Open.

The U.S. Open returned to the storied environs of the Olympic Club this year, for the fifth time, and these past champions returned to the Bay Area to revisit the scene of their long-ago triumphs, and to be fêted by appreciative golf enthusiasts. On the evening of Wednesday, June 13th, the night before the opening rounds of the 112th U.S. Open were to begin, one of these great champions from the past shared his recollections of those events with a roomful of golf fans – Billy Casper joined a group of the members of Lake Merced Golf Club for an evening of conversation and recollection, not only about those five eventful days in 1966 at the Olympic Club, but his entire career. I was privileged to be among Mr Casper’s audience that evening, as a guest of Lake Merced’s general manager, Donna Lowe. It was a wonderful evening with a great past champion of our game, and a fitting prelude to the competition that was to begin the following morning, less than a mile away, at the Olympic Club.

Billy Casper, 1966 United States Open champion, spoke to an attentive group at Lake Merced Golf Club on the evening of Wednesday, June 13th, 2012 – the night before the start of the 2012 United States Open at San Francisco’s Olympic Club, the site of his Open victory 46 years before. Photo credit: Sarah Reid/LMGC

As reflected in the title of his recent autobiography, The Big Three and Me, Casper languished somewhat in the shadow of the three most recognizable players of the late 1960s – Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, and Jack Nicklaus. This is quite amazing given their respective records: in the period from 1964 to 1970, Casper won 27 times on Tour to Nicklaus’ 25, and Palmer and Player’s combined 21. Casper’s victories in that six-year span included the 1966 U.S. Open, of course, and the 1970 Masters, both wins coming in playoffs. Casper acquired a reputation as something of an eccentric at the time – for instance, it was well known that he included exotic game meats such as buffalo, bear and elk in his diet; what was not so well known was that his eccentric diet came as a result of doctor’s orders to rotate different types of protein because of food allergies.

The Big Three and Me, the new autobiography of Billy Casper.

His audience learned this and much more as Mr Casper spoke that evening, sitting in the handsome dining room of the Lake Merced Golf Club’s clubhouse with the evening sun playing shadows across the 18th hole just over his shoulder. Introduced by his long-time friend, retired attorney James Parkinson (Mr Parkinson assisted Mr Casper in the production of his book), who acted as MC and prompter, Casper offered a retrospective of his life and career, with an emphasis on the events of that same week, 46 years earlier, when the U.S. Open came to the Olympic Club for the second time.

With a level of recall that is quite remarkable in a man 80 years of age, Casper related the events of that midsummer weekend nearly a half-century ago to a rapt audience. Palmer and Casper had come to the last nine holes on Sunday with Palmer in command of a 7-shot lead over Casper, and Jack Nicklaus another two shots back. As they made their way to the 10th tee, Palmer heard Casper say, “I’m going to have to play like hell just to finish second.” and responded “I’ll do everything I can to help you.” That somewhat cocky response from Palmer stiffened Casper’s resolve, and while Palmer turned his attention toward the larger goal of breaking the Hogan scoring record, and away from his fellow competitor and victory in the tournament at hand, Casper determined to do his best to do better than to “just finish second.”

With a nearly stroke-by-stroke recollection of their play over the last nine holes of Olympic’s Lake Course, Mr Casper related to the audience Palmer’s fall, and his own rise, over the closing holes of regulation play: Palmer’s duckhook into the rough at 10 for a bogey to Casper’s par, paring his lead to six; their matching pars and birdies at the 11th and 12th holes, respectively; another pull to the left by Palmer at the par-3 13th to Casper’s par – cutting Palmer’s lead to five with five holes to play. After matching pars at 14, the 15th hole changed things up – Casper was safely on in one, facing a breaking 20-foot putt for birdie, but Palmer’s over-confident try for the flag bounced off the firm, fast putting surface into the back rough. Casper rolled in his birdie putt and Palmer made bogey – a two-shot swing, and Palmer’s lead was now three, with three holes to play.

Now they came to the 16th hole, a big sweeping left-hander of a par-5 which was playing at 604 yards that day. The sixteenth hole had been a subject of conversation leading up to the beginning of play at the 2012 Open, due to a new tee box which stretched the length of the hole to a record-setting 670 yards. Though no one could have known it on that Wednesday evening before the tournament, the 16th hole was to play a part in the final result of the 2012 tournament that was similar to the part it had played in 1966.

Just as Jim Furyk was to do the Sunday following this evening’s talk, Palmer’s tee shot in 1966 went hard left off the tee. While Furyk’s tee shot ended up in the left-hand trees from a shortened tee – only 562 yards that day – Palmer’s drive from 604 ended up in the thick rough left of the fairway. He had tried for a long drawing tee shot that would get him close enough for a chance to get on in two, but he had tried too hard, and pulled it left. After two slashes at the ball with an iron, Palmer was out. His spoon (3-wood) from the fairway ended up in a greenside bunker, but he salvaged a bogey six with a blast out of the bunker and a 4-foot putt – “…the greatest six I ever made,” he called it later.

As good as Palmer’s save at 16 was, Casper had made a birdie with a conservative drive to the fairway, an advance to within a pitch-shot of the green with a spoon, and a wedge to fifteen feet. He rolled in the 15-footer for birdie and another two-shot swing – Palmer’s lead was down to a single stroke.

Stories of his life and career came easily to mind for Mr Casper – with only a little prompting from his long-time friend, and co-producer of his book, James Parkinson (seated). Photo credit: Sarah Reid/LMGC

Mr Casper recounted these events as if they had happened last week instead of nearly a half-century ago, and his audience of Lake Merced club members and guests hung on every word. He recalled how Palmer missed a seven-foot putt for par on the 17th hole, tying the tournament, and how, after matching pars at the amphitheater-like finishing hole, they finished in a dead-heat 278 after 72 holes of regulation play. The seven-stroke slide over the last nine holes seemed to have taken the wind out of Palmer’s sails, though, and Casper rolled up the victory in the 18-hole playoff the following day, carding a 1-under 69 to Palmer’s 3-over score of 73.

Two U.S. Opens at the Olympic Club, eleven years apart, two come-from-behind victories – and those of us in the audience at Lake Merced Golf Club that evening were lucky enough to hear the story of the second directly from the victor, Billy Casper. Mr Casper took a couple of questions from the audience before wrapping things up (asked if he still played as well as he used to, he said “I hit it so short now, I can hear my ball land.”), and then the evening was over – much too soon. He signed souvenir pin flags and copies of his book for audience members before leaving – mementoes of a memorable evening with a great champion.