Rainy conditions on the first of three potential 36-hole days at the Western Amateur might have made all the difference for Angus Flanagan. The Minnesota senior grew up in England. Rain clearly isn’t an issue.
Flanagan holed a 30-footer for birdie on his 72nd hole Thursday evening at Crooked Stick Golf Club in Carmel, Indiana, to wrap up Western Amateur medalist honors. Now the format switches to match play. Beginning Friday morning, there will be four rounds of it before a champion is determined on Saturday afternoon.
It was a dramatic finish for Flanagan, who used that birdie to put the finishing touch on a final-round 66 and reach 11 under for 72 holes.
Scoring: Western Amateur
Flanagan, who won a share of the Big Ten individual title in 2019, played the 3M Open on the PGA Tour last week. He earned his invite into the event by winning the Minnesota State Open on July 9 with a course-record, final-round 64 at Royal Golf Club in Lake Elmo. His name is certainly starting to make the rounds.
Seven players tied for the 16th position at even par, forcing a playoff to determine the sole player who would move on – and face Flanagan on Friday morning. Ultimately North Carolina’s Austin Hitt earned that honor. He outlasted an impressive crew of opponents in the playoff, including 2018 Western Amateur champion Cole Hammer along with Texas player Travis Vick, Pepperdine’s William Mouw and incoming Ohio State freshman Maxwell Moldovan.
The 2020 #WesternAmateur Sweet 16. pic.twitter.com/aS0CJpBNKh
— WGA Championships (@WGAChamps) July 31, 2020
Three of last year’s Sweet 16 are on the bracket again: Ricky Castillo, Turk Pettit and Davis Thompson, the latter being the returning Western Am medalist.
Among the marquee match-ups for Friday morning is defending U.S. Amateur champion Andy Ogletree against LSU’s Trey Winstead, who already made a run at both the North & South title and the Sunnehanna title. Behind them, Castillo – who made it to the semifinals at this event last year – takes on Vanderbilt’s Harrison Ott.
The lower bracket is topped by Sam Bennett, stroke-play runner-up and a Texas A&M junior, versus Connor Creasy, who just completed his senior year at the University of Georgia.
German Matthias Schmid, a Louisville player who won the 2019 European Amateur, takes on George Duangmanee, an incoming Virginia freshman, in the first round. Interestingly, there is another junior player on the bracket, too. Joseph Pagdin, No. 2 in the Golfweek Junior Rankings, will meet Thompson in the final match of the morning.
Oklahoma’s Quade Cummins was among those who barely missed the match-play cut along with Oklahoma State’s Austin Eckroat and recent Sunnehanna Amateur champion Preston Summerhays.
[lawrence-related id=778056630,778056150,778056026]