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By Chris Lang
PETERSBURG — Jordan Utley and Dustin Groves qualified for the U.S. Amateur Four-Ball Championship several years ago at Country Club of Petersburg, so both players had good vibes about the venue coming into the 108th Virginia State Golf Association Amateur Championship, played on the same course.
Like most mid-amateur players, their time playing golf is somewhat limited, even more so now that both have relatively new children in the house. Utley’s newest addition—Karsyn—is four months old. Groves’ newest little one—Rory—is five months.
Now the four-ball partners, each eager to finally win the Amateur championship, will face each other in Thursday’s quarterfinals. In all, the remaining field is evenly split, with four mid-ams and four college players left competing for the Schwarzschild Brothers trophy. By the end of the Thursday, the field will be cut to two.
“Dustin and I have had tons of conversations about this together,” Utley said. “How many times can we continue to put ourselves in this position? We’re only getting older. Our time practicing and playing is dwindling. But we still have the competitive fire, and this is a really good event to see what we can do.”
Among the quarterfinalists are two past State Open of Virginia champions (Jack Montague and Evan Beck), two players who have reached the Amateur semifinals (Alex Price and Jimmy Taylor), a first-time quarterfinalist (Ryan Patrick), a quarterfinalist from last year (Groves) and a two-time finalist (Utley). Also advancing was UVA’s Sam Jung, who tied for second in stroke-play qualifying.
Utley took out Virginia Tech’s Connor Burgess 3 and 2 in the morning before ousting UVA-bound Matthew Monastero in 19 holes in a thrilling afternoon match. Monastero forced extra holes by hitting his approach on 18 to 18 inches, and Utley won it on the first extra hole with an 8-foot birdie putt.
“The afternoon, that was definitely match play at its finest,” Utley said. “I’m up 3 through 11. I’m cruising. Then the next thing I know I’m standing on 16 tee box and it’s all square. It happens. He hits the ball a long way, has a good short game, and he hit a couple of tap-ins that put the pressure on me. The shot that I hit on 16 was huge to turn the momentum. I probably hit it to 3 or 4 inches off the 16th tee.”
Groves was exhausted after his two matches, which went a combined 39 holes. “The most golf I’ve played in a long, long time,” he said afterward. He defeated Richmond’s Garrett Kuhla in 19 holes in the morning before topping past VSGA Mid-Amateur champion Marshall Tinsley in 20 holes in the afternoon.
His reward was a match with a good friend in the quarterfinals.
“We know each of us are going to come up ready to play and ready to compete,” Groves said. “I don’t know, it’ll be a little weird, to be quite honest. But the ultimate goal is that we’re here to win a golf tournament.”
The other quarterfinal at the top half of the bracket features Montague and Patrick. Montague had a difficult road to the quarterfinals, defeating past VSGA Amateur champion Scott Shingler of Haymarket 1 up in the morning before squeezing out a 2-and-1 win over stroke-play qualifying medalist Teddy Zinsner of Alexandria in the afternoon.
“I knew going into today that I was going to have two really hard matches in front of me,” said Montague, who plays at UVA. “Scott and Teddy are really good players. I knew I had to go out and play well today, and thankfully I did that.”
The 36-year-old Patrick, who played college golf at Christopher Newport, took out Furman’s Ross Funderburke 2 and 1 in the morning and defeated accomplished VSGA senior Buck Brittain 1 up in the afternoon.
“Generally, if I can get out and play in two or three really competitive tournaments a year, I’m happy,” said Patrick, a three-time U.S. Mid-Amateur qualifier. “It’s been tough, I just started a new job in February. I haven’t been practicing that much, until about a week and a half ago. I’ve been hitting it well. I changed putters about a week and a half ago, and I’ve been putting great. If I get in a groove, I think I can compete with anybody.”
The bottom half of the bracket features Beck against Price in one matchup and Taylor against Jung in the other.
Beck took out Virginia Tech’s Drew Brockwell 4 and 3 in the morning and beat Ashburn’s Mehrbaan Singh, a rising senior at Independence High School, in 19 holes in the afternoon.
“I don’t get to play as much as I did in college,” Beck said. “So it’s good to still be alive and have maybe a couple of matches left. I’m excited to be in this position.”
Price, who will be a junior at Division III CNU, knocked out a pair of Hokies to earn his trip to the quarterfinals. A semifinalist last year at River Bend, he is looking to march even deeper in the Amateur this year.
“I’m looking for nothing else other than winning this golf tournament,” he said. “Especially after last year, whether people believe in me or not … I know my family does. … I’m going to go out there tomorrow with the mentality that it’s mine to lose.”
He knocked off current Hokie Charlie Hanson 1 up in the morning before using a strong 6 iron shot to within four feet of the cup on the par-3 16th to secure a 3-and-2 win over past Hokie Joey Jordan in the afternoon. Price said he finds a little extra motivation when he gets a chance to play against Division I players in match-play events.
“I want to show that even though we play D-III golf, we can still play, and we can play with the best of them,” Price said. “It’s always nice knocking D-I players out of the tournament. I did it a couple of times last year, too.”
Jung rallied late in the morning to defeat Cullen Campbell 2 and 1 in the morning before taking out Virginia Golf Hall of Famer Keith Decker in the afternoon by the same count.
“I’ve heard about him since I was little,” Jung said. “Up in Northern Virginia, he’s called Mr. 59, because I heard he shot 59 a couple of times. It was really an honor and playing with him. Man, we threw some punches out there. It swung back and forth, back and forth. It was a tough battle to the end.”
Taylor, who advanced to the Amateur semifinals at Keswick in 2019, defeated Radford’s Patrick Gareiss in 19 holes in the morning and nipped Virginia Tech’s Connor Johnson Jr. 2 up in the final match of the afternoon. Johnson had previously defeated David Stanford, who won last week’s VSGA Junior Match Play title, 4 and 3 in the morning.
Taylor won the match thanks to a stellar approach on 18 to within two feet. Johnson was short of the green and had to dunk his approach to extend the match, but the shot went long, securing Taylor’s win.
“Match play is my favorite type of tournament,” said Taylor, a rising junior at William & Mary. “I always tell myself, try to get into match play and just try to have fun. I love it.”
The semifinals are scheduled for Thursday after lunch, and the 36-hole championship match is set for Friday morning.
Lang is the VSGA’s manager of media and communications.