The first opposite-field event of the 2024 PGA Tour season was a two-man race down the stretch that went to a lengthy playoff.
On one side was Erik Barnes, who turned pro in 2011 but was making just his 22nd PGA Tour start. On the other was Brice Garnett, who six years ago won his lone tournament, the 2018 Corales Puntacana Resort and Club Championship in the Dominican Republic. This was his 241st start.
In a social media post from 2020 that resurfaced Sunday, Barnes talked about taking a job as a Grocery Replenishment Specialist, with the shifts starting at 4 a.m., during COVID when playing opportunities diminished on the Korn Ferry Tour.
“It’s a nice way of saying ‘stock boy’,” he said at the time.
The duo were tied for the lead after regulation at 19 under, with both making par on the 630-yard par-5 18th. In the playoff, they each went par-birdie-par before Garnett drained a long right-to-left breaking putt for a birdie, leaving Barnes to match with a putt from the fringe for birdie but he ran it by the left.
That ended the longest playoff in tournament history as Garnett won for the second time on Tour, six years after his first. He earned $720,000 for the win as well as full exempt status on the PGA Tour through the 2026 season.
He also earned a spot in this week’s 2024 Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.
Ben Kohles, Jimmy Stanger and Victor Perez, who shot a 65 Sunday, tied for third.
Amateur Jackson Van Paris, a junior at Vanderbilt playing in his first PGA Tour event, posted the low score in the final round, an 8-under 64. He was in 50th place to start the day but finished tied for 10th.
Jackson Van Paris picked a good place to pick up his first collegiate win.
Jackson Van Paris picked a good place to pick up his first collegiate win.
The junior at Vanderbilt captured the inaugural St. Andrews Links Collegiate on Tuesday in Scotland, shooting 9-under 131 on the Jubilee Course to win by three shots over teammate Cole Sherwood. The duo helped Vanderbilt lock up the top spot for Wednesday’s match play, where the No. 3 Commodores will take on top-ranked North Carolina in the championship match at the Old Course at St. Andrews.
The St. Andrews Links Collegiate features the North Carolina, Vanderbilt, Georgetown and Notre Dame men’s and women’s golf teams. The squads faced off Monday and Tuesday in 36 holes of stroke play. Come Wednesday, there will be match play on both sides.
On the women’s side, North Carolina will also face Vanderbilt, while the Georgetown and Notre Dame teams will battle for third place.
Van Paris fired rounds of 64 and 67 to take the title. Sherwood shot 68-66 to earn runner-up honors. North Carolina’s Peter Fountain finished solo third at 5 under.
In the team competition, Vanderbilt shot 23 under with the Tar Heels finishing five shots behind. Both men and women used a 6-count-5 scoring system instead of the usual 5-count-4 for stroke play.
Stars Gordon Sargent for Vanderbilt and David Ford for North Carolina didn’t play at the course the duo won the Walker Cup at last month because last week, they helped the U.S. win the World Amateur Team Championship in Abu Dhabi.
Kayla Smith won the 2023 St. Andrews Links Collegiate.
On the women’s side, it was North Carolina’s Kayla Smith earning medalist honors, finishing at 2-under 138. She won by two shots over Vanderbilt’s Ava Merrill. The Tar Heel women also earned the top seed for match play, finishing at 19 over with Vanderbilt coming in second at 29 over.
Two down, eight to go for Vanderbilt golfer Jackson Van Paris at Pinehurst Resort.
The 19-year-old from Pinehurst, North Carolina, set the course record on Pinehurst No. 4 just six weeks ago during the North & South Amateur and added his name to the record book at The Cradle, Pinehurst’s 9-hole par-3 short course designed by Gil Hanse.
Van Paris, shot an 18 on Sunday, carding an ace at No. 6, seven birdies and a par at the last. On the card, it reads: 2-2-2-2-2-1-2-2-3.
The new course record is one shot better than the previous mark shared by Jack Heath and Bob Windows.
Van Paris is having quite the summer on the course — he also won the Sunnehanna Amateur, posting another 61 there.
What will Van Paris do next? We can’t wait to see which record at Pinehurst’s 10 courses — soon to be 11 — he checks off next. For the record, the low round at No. 2, site of the 2024 U.S. Open, is shared by the likes of Tom Watson, Hale Irwin and Gibby Gilbert with 62.
It’s safe to say Jackson Van Paris knows his way around Pinehurst. The golf haven in North Carolina is his hometown. It’s also where he now has a course record.
Van Paris, a junior at Vanderbilt, shot a 9-under 61 at Pinehurst No. 4 on Tuesday in the opening round of the 2023 North & South Amateur, setting a new course record by two shots. He carded nine birdies and no bogeys to take a two-shot lead after the first of two rounds of stroke play.
“When you’re out there and playing a good round of golf, you’re trying not to think about it,” Van Paris said. “You’re trying to take it one shot, one hole at a time. But it’s about as good as it gets. It was a great day.”
The championship moves on to its second day of stroke play on Wednesday. The top 32 seeds will advance to match play, which begins on Thursday. The championship match is scheduled for Saturday afternoon.
Jackson Van Paris wasn’t an integral part of the Vanderbilt lineup last season, and that’s not necessarily his fault.
He was a talented sophomore stuck battling with one of the deepest lineups in college golf. He teed it up in only five tournaments, his best finish coming at the John Hayt Invitational at T-6.
Heading into his junior season, he has made a case he could be a big factor for the Commodores.
Van Paris won the 82nd Sunnehanna Amateur on Saturday at Sunnehanna Country Club in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. He shot 13-under 267, beating Ohio State’s Neal Shipley by one shot for the title. Van Paris won in big part thanks to his 9-under 61 in the second round, where he took the lead and never looked back.
Even with a bogey on his final hole, Van Paris shot 3-under 67 on Saturday to claim the title. Shipley started the final round two shots behind, carding a 4-under 66 on Saturday, but it wasn’t enough to catch Van Paris.
Sebastian Moss of Louisville shot 7 under in the final round to move into solo third at 11-under 269. Luke Clanton, Herman Senke and William Moll tied for fourth at 10 under.
The Sunnehanna Amateur is the first of seven men’s events that are a part of the Elite Amateur Series. Up next is the Northeast Amateur from June 19-24 at Wannamoisett Country Club in Rumford, Rhode Island.
Get to know the player who took down the two U.S. Junior Amateur favorites in the same day.
Welcome to the Luke Clanton show.
If you’re unfamiliar with the 17-year-old from Miami Lakes, Florida, let me hit you with some knowledge. He’s committed to Florida State, has won the Class 2A state title in two of the last three years and is off to a blistering start at this year’s U.S. Junior Amateur at The Country Club of North Carolina in the Village of Pinehurst.
“It was kind of funny because me and Ben were talking on the first tee and we kind of knew the whole day was going to be one-sided with the crowd,” explained Clanton.
Clanton took down top-seed Kelly Chinn in the morning Round of 32 on Thursday, 1 up, and then defeated Pinehurst local favorite Jackson Van Paris, 2 and 1, in the Round of 16.
“But it was an unbelievable experience with everyone out here. I can’t even think – I was looking down an iron shot and I saw like a bunch of people surrounding the green, so that’s kind of cool,” he continued. “I just said, ‘one shot at a time,’ and I played really well today. I think I only had one bogey and five birdies. It was just kind of one of those days where I took it one shot at a time, and Jackson is a great opponent, great player, known him for a while. It was fun today, and I just played a little bit better today. That’s it.”
Already this year, Clanton has three top-5 finishes, including a T-2 at the Dustin Johnson Junior Worlds. Last year he won the Arnold Palmer Invitational Junior and posted three top-10 finishes.
“He’s a great player, and he’s definitely a guy that you go into the match knowing you have to play good to beat,” said Van Paris after the match. “He’s not going to lay over. He’s a great competitor. I have no doubt that he’ll continue playing well and keep it going for the rest of the week.”
Awaiting Clanton in the quarterfinals is Vanderbilt-bound Gordon Sargent, a two-time defending Alabama State Amateur champion and three-time Rolex Junior All-American.
For Clanton, he believes in himself just as much as Van Paris.
The U.S. Junior marks two weeks out of the last four that Jackson Van Paris has entered a major tournament as the local favorite.
Fifteen players in the starting U.S. Junior field hail from North Carolina, but only one man calls this week’s host site, the Country Club of North Carolina, his home course. That puts a target on Pinehurst native Jackson Van Paris’s back, if not for his peers then at least for fans – especially local ones.
This marks two weeks out of the last four being the local hero. Over the Fourth of July weekend, Van Paris played his way into the final match at the North & South Amateur at Pinehurst (thanks in large part to a dramatic semifinal victory) before finishing runner-up to Australian Louis Dobbelaar.
Van Paris won the last AJGA Invitational he played in February, the Simplify Boys Championship at Carlton Woods, but this is likely to be the last real hurrah. That story would write itself.
Van Paris hit the first tee shot off the first tee at CCNC’s Dogwood Course on Monday morning to start the championship. He had rounds of 72-70 (the 70 on CCNC’s Cardinal Course) to land the No. 17 seed on the bracket. On Thursday, Van Paris took out another of the Carolina guys – Spencer Turtz – in 15 holes to start match play. Now there are only three remaining.
“The course was playing tough,” Van Paris said of a day he made only three birdies. “Neither Spencer nor I played our best. But it was just a grind. It’s one of those matches that neither of us played the way we wanted to, but you’ve just kind of got to grind it out. I got fortunate, I made a few really important putts for par and kind of kept momentum on my side for the most part, which was great, and then ended up making some birdies coming in, which was nice.”
Van Paris noted it was “weird” playing someone from North Carolina. You never want to meet a friend so early in the bracket, he said, but he may keep running into that problem. The 18-year-old has to get past Dutch buzzsaw Benjamin Reuter, who is playing his first USGA championship, in the next round and assuming that good friend Kelly Chinn makes it through another round, too, at the top of the bracket, the two would meet in the Round of 16.
“I mean, if you want to win the event you’ve got to beat them all anyways, so that’s kind of the way I look at it,” van Paris said. “So yeah, I don’t look at it any differently than even if I was playing a bunch of guys I’ve never heard of. I wouldn’t look at it any differently. You’ve just got to go out and try to play your game and play a little better than the guy you’re playing against.”
Van Paris got his edge over Turtz in the Round of 64 when he won three consecutive holes at Nos. 8-10. It was the little things that kept him in the match – like on the par-3 third when Van Paris got up-and-down from a drop zone for bogey and Turtz three-putted from 40 feet. They tied that hole.
“Stuff like that kind of needs to happen if you want to win matches when both guys are playing very well,” he said. “It was by no means a birdie fest out there.
“It’s really nice when you know you’re kind of grinding and you can kind of steal a few.”
Spoken like a guy with a little local knowledge on his side.
Australian Louis Dobbelaar now has six wins in the last two years.
Louis Dobbelaar and Jackson Van Paris put on a show in the final match of the 121st North & South Amateur.
On the famed Pinehurst No. 2, the two dueled in a match that never got more than 2 up in either’s advantage and ended after one extra hole that saw the 19-year-old Australian Dobbelaar take the trophy with a clutch up-and-down for par.
“This place is extremely special to me and to my family,” Dobbelaar said of his win at Pinehurst. “It hasn’t really sunk it in yet, but there’s nothing better than winning at a place like Pinehurst. … there’s history everywhere you look.”
A large crowd was on hand for the match, with the majority pulling for Van Paris, a 17-year-old Pinehurst local bound for Vanderbilt in the fall.
“To see that many people, it was amazing,” Van Paris said of the atmosphere. “It takes you out of the moment for a bit. You get to appreciate how special this all really is.”
“Hat’s off to Louis. He never really gave me any breathing room,” Van Paris said. “I chipped in and made a 40-footer and played pretty good golf, and still didn’t beat him. It was an incredible match. He’s a great champion.”
A Pinehurst local hasn’t won the North & South since Jack Fields in 2011. Dobbelaar has won six events in the last two years.
“We’ve been mates for a little while, so it was good to soak that in together,” added Dobbelaar. “We both just looked around and said how special it was. Those situations are generally pretty tense, but playing against someone like him, we were both able to see the broader side and appreciate the opportunity to be doing this.”
Van Paris held a 2 up lead through 14 holes but lost Nos. 15 and 16 due to a few errant shots and some handiwork around the greens by Dobbelaar, who kept the match even through 18 and into the extra hole.
On Sunday, Jackson Van Paris will celebrate the Fourth of July with a North & South title match against Louis Dobbelaar.
Jackson Van Paris won the last AJGA event he’s likely to ever play this February at the AJGA Simplify Boys Championship, despite freezing temperatures and an impending snowstorm. His junior-golf swan song will come later this month at the U.S. Junior at Country Club of North Carolina, his home track.
But Van Paris, a 17-year-old incoming freshman at Vanderbilt, has already arrived at the next level. A magical run at the North & South Amateur for the Pinehurst local proves that.
On Sunday, Van Paris will celebrate the Fourth of July by competing in the North & South title match against Louis Dobbelaar, the Australian who has already racked up wins in 2021 at the Dogwood Invitational and the Australian Amateur.
Van Paris arrived there after a dramatic semifinal victory over Chad Wilfong on the 20th hole. He chipped it in on Pinehurst’s second hole for victory over Wilfong, the Carolinas Mid-Amateur champion, in a scene that got the local crowd plenty riled up.
Now he has a chance to add to a resume that also includes victory at the Sage Valley Junior Invitational. In 2018, a 14-year-old Van Paris not only made match play at the U.S. Amateur at Pebble Beach, but won his first-round match to become the youngest competitor to win a match at the U.S. Amateur since Bobby Jones reached the quarterfinals in 1916.
Van Paris had to get past Cal player Finigan Tilly in Saturday morning’s quarterfinals to even get to Wilfong. On the other side of the bracket, Dobbelaar defeated fellow Aussie Karl Vilips before taking down Clemson’s Zack Gordon for his spot in the final.
Pinehurst No. 2, in the Sand Hills of North Carolina, has typically been a place where Aussies excel, and Dobbelaar might just be the latest one.
The North & South should have been ended on Saturday, but a lengthy weather Friday weather delay pushed the final match into Sunday. The match goes off at 6:50 a.m. ET.
Jackson Van Paris became the first player in this AJGA invitational’s 34-year history to win multiple titles.
With much of Texas blanketed in snow and record-low temperatures on Monday, Jackson Van Paris found himself with a little extra time to reflect on a junior-golf title bagged, unbelievably, a day earlier. Van Paris, like the rest of the field, piled on the layers and donned a beanie for the final round of the AJGA’s Simply Boys Championship at Carlton Woods, the first invitational of the season and one where the schedule was scrambled to fit in 54 holes.
“The conditions – they were pretty hard,” Van Paris said. “When it’s 35 degrees out here, you’re wearing three, four, five layers the entire round. Definitely doesn’t allow you to hit some of the shots you normally would be able to hit in 65-, 70-degree weather.”
The Van Parises, from Pinehurst, North Carolina, imagined they might be in the Lone Star State a few more days as the winter storm raged. It will go down as quite the memory, particularly if this happens to be Van Paris’s final AJGA invitational start.
It’s a possibility, but not a certainty.
Most of Van Paris’s summer will be taken up by amateur events as he transitions to the next level before his freshman year at Vanderbilt. The Western Amateur, Sunnehanna Amateur, Terra Cotta Amateur and North & South Amateur are among those on his wishlist. Van Paris, 17, already appeared in some of those events this past summer. Most recently, he finished 72nd at the Jones Cup earlier this month.
“Trying to transition to amateur golf just to kind of get used to what it will be like in college,” he said.
Van Paris is ranked No. 9 in Golfweek’s Junior rankings and No. 279 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking. He has been as high as No. 64 in the latter ranking. These past six months, despite his game feeling solid, he hasn’t felt his scores have matched. The familiarity of the Club at Carlton Woods in The Woodlands, Texas, site of last week’s Simplify Boys Championship, helped change that.
Jackson Van Paris fist bumps a military member during the final round of the AJGA Simplify Boys Championship at Carlton Woods. (AJGA photo)
With his win, Van Paris became the first repeat champion in the tournament’s 34-year history, having also won the event in 2019. The AJGA condensed a three-day tournament into two by making Friday’s opening round a 36-hole day as the winter storm loomed. A few players had to finish their second round on Saturday before the start of the third round, but the field finished by Saturday evening as temperatures dipped into the 30s.
Van Paris fired rounds of 69-68-66 to win by five shots at 13 under. Golfweek’s top-ranked junior, David Ford of Peachtree Corners, Georgia, finished runner-up.
“I honestly think coming back to a place I’ve won before helped me,” Van Paris said. “I’ve won here in the past, I know my game is good enough to win here. I love the golf course.”
He would have another chance to test that theory next month had the Junior Invitational at Sage Valley, one of the elite events in junior golf, gone on as planned, but the event has been canceled because of COVID. Van Paris won’t get to defend the tournament he won on the cusp of another natural disaster in March 2020.
There are still perks on the calendar, though, and perhaps none bigger than playing his final U.S. Junior Amateur at his home course, the Country Club of North Carolina, in July.
Van Paris is the rare player who has given enormous amounts of his time back to the game – not just through hours spent on the putting green and the driving range, but by getting involved in the giving-back component of golf. He served as a player representative to the AJGA board in 2020 and devoted considerable energy to one particular charitable effort.
Jackson Van Paris with the AJGA’s Jerry Cole Sportsmanship Award at the AJGA’s year-end virtual “banquet” in 2020. (AJGA photo)
For the past six years, Van Paris’s name has been synonymous with the Carolina Cup, an event that has raised $250,000 in four years on behalf of the Nicklaus Children’s Health Care Foundation and the ACE Grant. Starting in 2017, he helped run the event with his family and through assistance from the AJGA. It’s the kind of event passed down from one junior-golf family to the next, and the Van Parises will pass the torch now, too.
Van Paris alone has raised more than $32,000 for charity during his involvement with the Carolina Cup. He was honored with the AJGA’s Jerry Cole Sportsmanship Award at the end of last year and gained loads of perspective from learning how to apply his talents to something bigger than golf.
“I really don’t know if I ever saw myself before doing it but now after running it for three or four years I really couldn’t see myself not doing it,” he said. “It’s been really cool and an opportunity I’m very thankful for and feel lucky to have been a part of.”
In many respects, including his charitable efforts, Van Paris seemed to go from junior golf to the cusp of adulthood in an instant. Not even four years have passed since Van Paris made match play as a 14-year-old at the 2018 U.S. Amateur at Pebble Beach. When he won his first-round match against Dylan Perry, it made him the youngest competitor to win a match at the U.S. Amateur since Bobby Jones reached the quarterfinals in 1916.
Jackson Van Paris watches his second shot on the first hole during the Round of 64 at the 2018 U.S. Amateur at Pebble Beach Golf Links in Pebble Beach, Calif. (Photo by USGA/Chris Keane)
“I was 14 and didn’t really know what I was doing yet,” he said. “Just went out there and played golf and happened to have stuff go my way and play really well, made match play and won a match. That was really cool, and ever since then, I’ve kind of just tried to play amateur events periodically and get a feel for what it’s like.”
Van Paris imagines he’ll study either human organizational development or economics when he lands at Vanderbilt next fall, but he hasn’t decided for certain yet.
Van Paris and his friend Gordon Sargent, who hails from Birmingham, Alabama, and finished third at the Simplify Boys, committed to play for the Commodores within 24 hours of each in 2018. They’ll room together as freshmen, and Van Paris hopes he’s part of the next wave of Vanderbilt golf glory. After meeting head coach Scott Limbaugh and assistant coach Gator Todd, he couldn’t imagine playing anywhere else.
Given his track record, one would imagine that’s Van Paris’s impact in Nashville will extend far past his scoring average.
