The USGA’s run of six consecutive weeks of championships concludes this week with the association’s oldest championship, the 121st U.S. Amateur at Oakmont Country Club. The combination of the championship and the venue provide the makings for a memorable week in western Pennsylvania.
Since it was founded by Henry Fownes in 1903, Oakmont has set the standard for championship play that evaluates all aspects of a player’s game, physical and mental. The test begins with 18 holes of stroke play on Monday and Tuesday to whittle the 312 competitors to 64 for match play. The field will be divided each day, with half playing Oakmont and half playing stroke play co-host Longue Vue Club. Six rounds of match play will commence on Wednesday at Oakmont, ending with Sunday’s 36-hole final.
Though the 2021 USGA season is far from over, with four championships and the Curtis Cup Match yet to come, the U.S. Amateur is squarely in the spotlight. Here are 3 Things to Know about the stroke-play rounds.
Amateur Legacy
Although Oakmont is best known for its record nine U.S. Opens (Jack Nicklaus’ playoff victory over Arnold Palmer in 1962 and Johnny Miller’s triumphant closing 63 in 1973 among them), the club is hosting its sixth U.S. Amateur. That ties it with Merion Golf Club and The Country Club for the most U.S. Amateurs of any venue. Bob Jones reached two U.S. Amateur finals at Oakmont, losing one (in 1919 to Davidson Herron), then winning one (in 1925 over Watts Gunn). The most recent U.S. Amateur played here was in 2003, won by Nick Flanagan of Australia.
“We are fortunate to be able to bring the U.S. Amateur to some of the iconic venues in the country, and Oakmont is almost in a league of its own with the history and the test of golf it presents,” said Ben Kimball, who has handled U.S. Amateur course setup for the USGA since 2011. “It will certainly be a special memory.”
Perhaps the champion will even have a room in the clubhouse named for him, a la Steve Melnyk, who captured the fourth of the five previous Amateurs here, in 1969.
Take the Longue Vue
Kimball raises an interesting question about stroke play: if players had their choice, would they prefer to play their first round at Oakmont or at the Longue Vue Club?
“I would be curious to know what players think,” Kimball said. “Would they feel like they needed to get after it and post a low score at Longue Vue, just in case they struggle at Oakmont, or would they prefer to play Oakmont first?”
Kimball inserts a note of caution to those who look at Longue Vue’s scorecard yardage of 6,647 yards and immediately think “green light.” There is more than meets the eye to the Robert White design that is perched 200 feet above the Allegheny River in Verona, about 6 miles from Oakmont. Oh, there’s a bit of history as well to this club, which opened in 1920 and was the site of Arnold Palmer’s victory in the 1950 Western Pennsylvania Amateur, as well as a U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship in 1966.
“Although it will be scoreable, players are going to need to be smart in their approach,” said Kimball. “The greens will be firm, with speeds in the low- to mid-13s, and there are undulations, false fronts and generally challenging putts. Take No. 10; it’s only 144 yards, but you can’t just fire right at the hole. You might decide to leave it 20 feet below the hole and give yourself an uphill chance. I think it will be a really solid test for these players.”
Watch List
A total of 58 of the 312 players in the field earned their spots through exemptions, based on past USGA performance or their placement in the World Amateur Golf Ranking. Thirteen USGA champions are in the mix, including one of the hottest amateurs in the world, 2018 U.S. Junior Amateur champion Michael Thorbjornsen of Wellesley, Mass. Thorbjornsen, 19, who is a sophomore at Stanford University, won the Massachusetts Amateur last month (carding an eye-popping 12 birdies in the first 18 holes of his victory over Matt Parziale), and he added a victory in the Western Amateur on July 31. His victory there included match-play wins over four fellow competitors in this championship, including Ricky Castillo, a member of the 2021 USA Walker Cup Team.
Nick Dunlap, 17, of Huntsville, Ala., captured the U.S. Junior Amateur on July 24 at the Country Club of North Carolina. Dunlap also won this year’s Dustin Johnson Junior World Championship, placed second in the Pete Dye Invitational, tied for second in the Wyndham Invitational and tied for fifth in the Western Junior. Also watch for Joe Highsmith, 21, of Lakewood, Wash., who went 3-0 in match play to help Pepperdine University capture the 2021 NCAA Championship. He qualified for the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines and also tied for second in this year’s Pacific Coast Amateur. At least 35 of the top 50 players in the World Amateur Golf Ranking are here, making the U.S. Amateur once again the deepest field in amateur golf.
Ron Driscoll is the senior manager of content for the USGA. Email him at rdriscoll@usga.org.
