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By Chris Lang
ROANOKE — For the last two days, amateur Jeff Long and professional Fielding Brewbaker have played in the same grouping at the Delta Dental State Open of Virginia at Ballyhack Golf Club, so they’re plenty familiar with each other.
They’ll be in the final group together on Saturday as the championship reaches its conclusion. Though to assume one of the two will win would be folly, considering how tightly packed the leaderboard is after two days of play.
Long and Brewbaker are tied for the lead after shooting aggregate 8-under-par 136 over the tournament’s first two days. But in all, nine players will enter Saturday’s third and final round within five shots of the lead.
“Out here, nobody’s ever really out of it,” said Brewbaker, a Salem native who has contended often at Ballyhack but is still seeking his first victory in the event. “In years past, I’ve started a final round four or five shots back and had a hot front nine and found myself maybe one off the lead heading to the back. That’s more than a chance to win.
“Anything can happen out here. You can’t take the time to worry about what the 10th-place guy is doing, or the second-place guy is doing. You just have to focus on what you’re doing right now. I know that’s cliché, but it’s really true out here. This golf course forces you to do that, or you pay for it.”
Brewbaker and Long, an Ashburn resident who is a member at Evergreen Country Club, were the only two players in the field to post two rounds in the 60s. Brewbaker followed his opening-round 69 with a 67, and Long went 67-69 to get to 136. Like Brewbaker, Long is looking for his first State Open win.
“I’m excited,” Long said. “I’m exactly where I want to be, with a chance to win going into the final day, for sure.”
Lurking just behind Long and Brewbaker are a pair of professionals who posted the two best scores on Friday. Steven Delmar, who works at Columbia Country Club in Maryland, followed his opening-round 71 with a 6-under-par 66 on Friday for a two-day 137, a round boosted by a hot stretch near the turn. Starting on No. 10, he birdied 18 and then made birdie on five of the first six holes on the front nine to surge into contention.
If Delmar’s name sounds familiar, it’s because the former Coastal Carolina player set the Ballyhack competitive course record in 2016 with a first-round 64, a tally matched by Michael Brennan in last year’s second round.
“I hadn’t made a putt in a while,” said Delmar, who is one shot off the lead. “I played the Maryland Open and made three birdies the whole tournament and finished 11th. I played solid, but I didn’t make any putts. So I putted for an hour and a half after yesterday’s round and came out this morning and putted for a while too. I don’t know, I just started rolling them more on the line that I was seeing.”
Elliott Wilson, PGA, the director of golf at Midlothian’s Independence Golf Club, returned Friday’s best score, a 7-under 65 that moved him into a tie for fourth with Brennan and left him with a two-day 139, three shots off the lead.
“I couldn’t really find a feeling yesterday with my swing, to be honest,” Wilson said. “And I still haven’t really figured it out. My game lives and dies by hitting greens, and I rolled the ball awesome today and just made a bunch of putts. I definitely hit it in some funny spots, but I didn’t do anything dumb.”
Brennan, the 16-year-old Leesburg teenager who tied for low amateur honors last year, shot 70 but left himself in position to contend on Saturday.
“I’d say it was a pretty frustrating 70,” said Brennan, a member at River Creek Club. “It could have been better. I bogeyed two of the par 5s, and they were both pretty short and reachable. I haven’t birdied (the par-5 2nd hole) yet, and that’s a driver 4-iron or driver 5-iron, and I’ve made par both days. I made a couple of good putts, a couple good par saves to keep me in it. But I need to play the par 5s a little better.”
Herndon’s Kurtis Grant, an Army Navy CC member who will begin his college career at West Virginia University next month, is tied for sixth with past State Open champion Rick Schuller. Both posted identical rounds of 70 on each of the championship’s first two days and sit four shots out of the lead.
Tied for eighth, five shots back at 141, are Haymarket amateur Scott Shingler (Dominion Valley CC) and Blacksburg 17-year-old Christopher Zhang. Shingler was tied for the lead after Thursday’s first round. But starting off No. 10, he said he had a “bizarre” round where he struggled mightily off the tee. He turned at 5 over before recouping three shots on his back nine.
“The way it started it out on the front nine, to shoot 3 under on the back, I’m happy,” Shingler said. “It could have gone the other direction out here really quickly.”
One player who made a significant move Friday was Henrico’s Mark Lawrence Jr., a rising Virginia Tech senior who won the 2017 VSGA Amateur Championship and reached the semifinals of the 2017 U.S. Amateur. A quadruple bogey in Thursday’s first round contributed to a 4-over-par total of 76, but he recovered with a 4-under 68 on Friday. He’ll enter Saturday eight shots off the lead, but stranger things have happened at Ballyhack.
“The year I was in the playoff with Lanto (Griffin) and Jay (Woodson), I think Jay was seven shots back to start the day, and he ended up winning,” Lawrence said, referencing the 2016 Delta Dental State Open. “So you never know. … It just depends. There’s a lot of good players in front of me and I’m probably going to need some help.”
Sixty-eight players made the 36-hole cut for Saturday’s final round by shooting 151 or better.