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By Chris Lang
KESWICK – Ben Cooper stood by his golf cart at Keswick Golf Club Wednesday
afternoon exhausted after winning a marathon match to advance to the
quarterfinals of the 106th Virginia State Golf Association Amateur
Championship. At that moment, he realized why he appreciated the match-play
format so much.
“I grew up playing soccer and golf, and the
one thing I miss now that my soccer career is over is that at of the end of the
game, you’re all fatigued, and you need to find that adrenaline to keep going,”
he said. “I love that. You don’t get that as much in golf, but today was
probably as close as that as you’ll get. You’re mentally and physically tired,
the adrenaline is going, the heart is pumping a little bit. It’s just a lot of
fun.”
Cooper was one of eight players to win
twice during a sizzling day at Keswick’s Full Cry course, setting up a
decidedly young quarterfinal round where four juniors and three college players
remain. The oldest player remaining in the field is stroke-play medalist Connor
Messick, who is 23 and recently completed his college eligibility.
A quick look at the quarterfinalists:
CONNOR
MESSICK (Oak Hill/International CC)
Seed: 1
Results: defeated No. 32 Jack
Montague (Manakin-Sabot), 1 up; defeated No. 16 Teddy Zinsner (Alexandria), 19
holes
How he got
here: Messick sweated out two difficult matches to earn his spot in the
quarterfinals. In the morning, he held a 2-up lead with three holes to play
before Montague, who plays at the University of Virginia, dug deep to force the
match to the 18th hole. Montague got into trouble off the tee on the
final hole, flaring his drive right and into the rough, allowing Messick to win
the hole with a par and advance.
His round of 16 match with Zinsner was even
tighter, as neither player led by more than 1 up at any point in the match.
Messick went to 18 with a 1-up lead, but his drive went left while Zinsner was
right down the middle. Messick hit his approach out of a fairway bunker long,
and Zinsner stuck his second shot to within four feet and converted the birdie
to extend the match.
The tide turned on No. 1, though, the first
extra hole. Zinsner topped his drive and had to hit his second shot from well
short of the start of the fairway. That second shot went into a red penalty area,
and though he was able to get it out without a penalty stroke, it went into a
greenside bunker, and he wasn’t able to hole out from there. Messick made a
two-putt par to win.
MICHAEL
BRENNAN (Leesburg/River Creek Club)
Seed: 8
Results: Def. No. 25 Greg Pappas
(Fairfax), 3 and 2; def. No. 9 Bryce Johnson (Oakton), 19 holes
How he got
here: Brennan sank a birdie putt on 17 to take a 1-up lead and caught a bad
break when his drive on 18 landed in a divot on the fairway. He hit his
approach heavy, leaving it well short of the green, and made bogey while
Johnson calmly made par to send the match to extra holes.
On No. 1, Johnson’s approach went about 25
feet past the hole, while Brennan’s came up just short of the green. After
Johnson’s par putt fell short, Brennan banged home his 19-foot putt for birdie
and unleashed a yell and a fist pump in celebration.
“This morning, I had a putt from probably
five feet on about the same line, I was maybe a little further left,” Brennan
said. “I misread it. I played it to go a little left to right and it actually
went the other way. Later today, when I played it again, I kind of misread it
again. So with both of those combined, I knew I was really close on that putt.
I knew I had the line. I just tried to get the speed right.”
CONNOR
BURGESS (Lynchburg/Boonsboro CC)
Seed: 4
Results: Def. No. 29 Jeff Long
(Ashburn), 5 and 4; def. No. 13 Larkin Gross (Center Cross), 5 and 4
How he got
here: Rather comfortably. A semifinalist last year, Burgess was never in any
real danger on Wednesday, jumping out to big leads in both of his matches
before closing out his opponent on the 14th green in both sessions.
A rising junior at Virginia Tech, Burgess said his putter got hot early and
stayed hot throughout the day.
“I think these greens have gotten better
over the last couple of days, and I’ve been putting well,” Burgess said. “I was
just playing my normal golf, playing fairways and greens and I got a few to
roll in. I got off to a good start in my second match. I holed out on the
second hole for eagle, and that kind of got me going.”
PETER
GASPERINI (South Boston/Halifax CC)
Seed: 12
Results: Def. No. 21 Colin
Caporal (Gainesville), 6 and 4; def. No. 5 George Duangmanee (Fairfax), 2 and 1
How he got
here: Birdies, birdies and more birdies. He made 14 of them in his two
matches, including five straight on the back nine to close out Caporal in the
morning. The Radford senior was 4 up on Duangmanee at the turn in the
round-of-16 match before fending off a game charge from his teenage opponent.
Gasperini, who sports a slick red
moustache, is making his second straight semifinal appearance and will face a
good friend in Burgess in the quarterfinals.
“We are good buddies, so I can assume that
we’re both looking forward to that match,” Gasperini said. “And I wouldn’t be
surprised if there weren’t a few people out watching us tomorrow.”
BEN COOPER
(Richmond/CC of Virginia)
Seed: 2
Results: Def. No. 31 Jacob
Laughlin (Massanutten), 3 and 1; def. No. 15 Buck Brittain (Tazewell), 21 holes
How he got
here: Cooper, who is headed to the University of Richmond next season and
recently qualified for the U.S. Junior Amateur, had to outlast the oldest
player remaining in the field in Brittain, a two-time Senior Open of Virginia
champion.
Cooper sank a 10-foot birdie putt on No. 3,
the third extra hole, to advance past Brittain. Both players made long birdie
putts on the first extra hole before making pars on the par-5 2nd.
“A lot of credit to him,” Cooper said. “It
seemed like every time I made a putt to get something going, he’d make one to
set it all back. He really kept me on my toes. I have a lot of respect for him.”
JIMMY TAYLOR
(Alexandria/Belle Haven CC)
Seed: 7
Results: Def. No. 26 Carter
Morgan (Tappahannock), 2 and 1; def. No. 23 Brandon Berry (Great Falls), 5 and
4
How he got
here: By playing the same steady golf that helped him reach the final match at
the VSGA Junior Match Play Championship last week in Williamsburg. Taylor, who
will begin his college career at William and Mary later this summer, gradually
built a lead over Morgan in the morning match, going 3 up after a birdie on the
14th hole before handling Berry, who plays at Loyola (Md.), in the
round of 16. His quarterfinal against Cooper will be the only match featuring
two junior competitors.
CAMERON MOORE
Seed: 3
Results: Def. No. 30 Ben
Ramsey (Bluefield), 1 up; def. No. 19 Mark Lawrence Jr. (Richmond), 1 up
How he got
here: Moore backed up his strong stroke-play qualifying rounds with a pair of
hard-fought victories on Wednesday. Making his first match-play appearance at
the Amateur, Moore (The Dominion Club) slipped past Ramsey in the opener before
defeating his Virginia Tech teammate and 2017 VSGA Amateur champion Lawrence in
the round of 16. Moore took the lead for good against Lawrence when he made a
birdie on No. 13, a hole in which Lawrence’s second shot strayed left, forcing
him to hit from underneath a tree. The players parred out after that, giving
Moore the slim victory.
CHRISTOPHER
ZHANG (Blacksburg/Blacksburg CC)
Seed: 11
Results: Def. No. 22 Clifford
Foster (Richmond), 4 and 3; def. No. 27 Jordan Utley (Midlothian), 1 up
How he got
here: Zhang, who will play college golf at Northwestern University, admitted
on Tuesday that he didn’t have much experience in match-play events. That didn’t
stop him from winning twice, including a victory against two-time Amateur
finalist Utley in the round of 16. After Utley failed to hole out from the
bunker for birdie on 18, Zhang sunk a nervy 4-foot putt to advance to the
quarterfinals in his first appearance at a VSGA Amateur.
Lang is the editor of Virginia Golfer magazine and the VSGA’s manager,
digital media.