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By Chris Lang
WILLIAMSBURG — Mark Boedicker freely admitted it. He didn’t pack enough clothes for a week’s stay at the Golden Horseshoe, so he was off to buy some new ones Thursday afternoon. It’s a fine problem to have when it means an unexpected berth in the championship match of the 71st Virginia State Golf Association Senior Amateur Championship.
Boedicker, a Great Falls resident who is a member of Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, eliminated past event champions David Partridge (19 holes) and Keith Decker (3 and 2) Thursday at the Golden Horseshoe’s Gold Course to advance to Friday’s 18-hole championship match, where he’ll face another first-time finalist in Manakin-Sabot’s Cam Young.
All Young did was shoot 64 in his afternoon semifinal match against medalist Buck Brittain of Tazewell, giving him a 1-up victory in a sensational match in which the players combined for 13 birdies and no bogeys.
Friday’s final between Boedicker and Young (Independence GC) is scheduled for 7:30 a.m.
“I’ve never been in this position,” Boedicker said. “But I’m looking forward to playing Cam. He’s a good friend. No matter what happens tomorrow, I’ve already won.”
After defeating Phil Mahone to open match play, each of Young’s final three matches went to at least the 18th green. He defeated Mike Howell (International CC) in 19 holes in the quarterfinals Friday morning before facing Brittain (The Virginian GC), who slipped by Jim Gallagher (Sleepy Hole GC) 2 up in the quarterfinals.
The Brittain-Young match was a duel from the start. Young, one half of the winning side at May’s VSGA Senior Four-Ball Stroke Play Championship, opened with a birdie to go 1 up, but Brittain quickly evened the match with a birdie on No. 2. During the match, three holes were halved with birdies, and Young didn’t take the lead for good until draining a 6 footer for birdie on the par-3 16th.
“When you’re playing Buck, you know you have to play well,” Young said. “Because he’s going to hit it right down the middle, and he’s probably—if not the best—he’s one of the two or three best putters in the state. You’ve got to make putts. And today, I probably had my best putting day in a long time. I made some putts when I really needed them today.
“I tried to rise to the challenge, because when you play Buck, you have to. You can’t come out here and beat Buck the way I putted the first two days here.”
After Young and Brittain halved the par-4 17th, each reached the 18th green in regulation but had long putts. Young was first, with his long putt from the front of the green coming up about four feet short. Brittain’s long putt from the right side of the green just missed falling, and Young converted his nervy par putt to clinch the match.
“We were both hitting it in tight … it was a heck of a match,” Young said. “It was probably the greatest match I’ve ever been a part of. We were both out there competing really hard. He played great. I played great. I just made one more putt than he did. … One of those matches that nobody deserves to lose, really.”
Boedicker’s run to the final match included victories over Vinny Giles, Jim Nirich, Partridge and Decker, four players with 57 VSGA championships between them. Decker (1st), Giles (2nd) and Partridge (6th) are all in the top six when it comes to all-time VSGA championships won. No doubt, Boedicker earned his spot in Friday’s final match.
“If you look at the pedigree of those three guys, I’m not even close to being in the field,” Boedicker said. “It’s just one of those things where you’re honored to play the best players.”
Boedicker made one key tactical change between the two qualifying rounds and match play—he went from a short putter back to his old long putter. In fact, in his opening match against Giles, he took his 3-wood out of his bag and carried two putters, unsure of which one would serve him best.
The long stick won out, and the short putter was out of the bag by Wednesday afternoon.
“I just stuck with it on the putting green,” Boedicker said. “It started feeling really good. I was comfortable without anchoring it. And all of a sudden, it just clicked. My confidence clicked. My ball striking clicked. … It feels really good.”
Chris Lang is the editor of Virginia Golfer magazine and the VSGA’s Manager, Digital Media.