Lakewood resident Monica Lieving won the World Long Drive Championship on Sunday at Bobby Jones Golf Course in Atlanta. The victory cemented Lieving as the new female face of the sport, just one year after she started to take it seriously by getting a coach and proper equipment.

“This feels incredible,” Lieving told reporters after the win. “Ultimately I blocked it all out and stayed true to myself, and I’m the one with the belt, so I’m feeling pretty good.”

Lieving, who entered the tournament as the No. 2 woman in the world, won the WLD belt and a $25,000 payout by beating top-ranked Phillis Meti in the finals. Meti didn’t put a ball in play during the round, enabling Lieving to win with a 288-yard drive.

“I knew I needed to get a ball in play (after Meti failed to hit the grid) and that it didn’t need to be my farthest,” Lieving said. “You have to roll with the game sometimes, and that’s what I did.

“I couldn’t have painted a better picture (for this win). It’s incredible to face (Meti) and I wanted to face her. The matchup was exactly what I pictured in my head.”

Lieving started Sunday with a 319-yard shot to beat Kelly Rudney in the quarterfinals, and then she blasted a 349-yard drive to oust Alexis Belton in the semis. Meanwhile, Meti hit a 382-yard shot in the quarterfinals that was the longest drive by a woman on tour this year. But the Atlanta resident couldn’t summon that same mojo in the finals.

The result was Lieving’s third win on tour in her rookie season, which propelled her back to the No. 1 ranking she held earlier in the year.

“That (382-yard drive by Meti) was pretty intimidating,” Lieving said. “But the most important thing about this sport is what happens in one set doesn’t affect the next. So although she went in the 380s, that didn’t necessarily mean we’d have the same conditions in the finals. I just focused on myself and tried to hit my best ball, and I knew I had it in me.”

This could just be the start of Lieving’s dominance in the niche sport. A former Division I golfer at Arkansas State, Lieving’s longest career drive is 375 yards, which came during a WLD event at Bigfoot Turf Farm in La Salle. She won the tour’s first two events this year before finishing strong on Sunday to upset Meti, a three-time champion.

Lieving, who works as a Denver-area realtor and currently doesn’t have any sponsors, hopes Sunday’s win will help ease the financial burden that comes with competing as she looks to continue her ascent.

“I’m just going to keep rolling,” Lieving said. “This is my first full year on tour and I have a lot of years left as long as I want to do it. I’m going to keep getting (my club speed and ball speed) faster.”

Lieving’s victory in Atlanta marked the second notable achievement by a local in the sport this year. In August, Andrew Eigner, a fellow Lakewood resident and one of Lieving’s best friends, won the WLD amateur championship.

Including that title, Eigner won four amateur events this year before turning pro and qualifying for this week’s championship, where he didn’t advance out of the opening round.

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Andrew Eigner and Monica Lieving will be competing at the World Long Drive Championships at Bobby Jones Golf Course in Atlanta starting Wednesday. Eigner, 28, was the tour’s top-ranked amateur after four wins this summer capped by winning the amateur world championship in August. He’s ranked No. 42 in the open division and is making his pro debut this week.

Lieving, 25, is the No. 2 women’s player in the world amid a breakout rookie season. Lieving won the tour’s first two events of the year, held the No. 1 ranking for a while and is one of the favorites to win the women’s title this weekend.

For the Lakewood residents and close friends, it’s been an intertwined ascension in a niche sport as they each strive to be the longest off the tee in the world.

“As an 11-year-old, I remember watching long drive on ESPN and wanting to be the world champion in long drive in the open division, and that dream remains reachable,” Eigner said. “I still have to go further in the process to really give myself a great chance at that, but I believe that I will at some point. This season has been (a springboard). And for Monica, I believe that title is inevitable.”

Eigner’s gone all-in on his dream, quitting his engineering job to do charity golf outings and play on the World Long Drive tour full-time. He first tried a WLD event in 2012, but it wasn’t until last year that he started to seriously apply himself to the sport.

“A couple years ago, he didn’t really care about actually competing on tour, because he was just content with doing the charity stuff,” explained Eigner’s coach, Dillon Fay. “But now, he has pushed the chips all in the middle to go compete and carve out time in his schedule, and even sacrificing money (from hosting charity events) to go compete.

“He’ll be the best in the world, I have no doubt. There’s no reason why he can’t. And it could be the greatest bottom-to-top transformation of a competitor in the history of the sport. He’s not a big guy — he’s 5-9 and he’s strong — but in a sport where (height) matters he will win a world title, because he won’t settle for less.”

In his career, Eigner’s longest competitive drive is 451 yards, and his longest-ever came during a charity event when he blasted a 525-yard shot at Flying Horse North that drove the back of a par-5 green.

He’s now seeing results in advanced metrics. Since he began working with Fay a year ago, his ball speed (the exit velocity of the shot off the tee) is up significantly from around 200 miles per hour to 215.5 entering the world championships. His club speed also increased, currently sitting at 145.5 mph.

That still puts Eigner behind most of the top pros, whose ball speed is usually 220 mph and above, but Fay said Eigner’s ability to hit clutch shots will be his differentiator in Atlanta. To win the amateur world title, the southpaw hit a 382-yard drive to advance on his final shot of the quarterfinal round and then a 384-yard drive on his last shot in the finals to win in dramatic fashion.

Fay said Eigner is a “darkhorse” to win the open championship.

“Over about 220, 225 miles per hour, the ball starts giving diminishing returns where it’s really hard to control the flight and the spin,” Fay explained. “So Andrew’s in a position where he can still be competitive if he’s throwing up 215, because even with the speed gap, the optimization of the ball means a lot more.”

While Eigner’s goal is to make it to the Round of 16, Lieving has emerged as one of the female faces of the sport less than two years after one of her drives crossed Eigner’s path at Arrowhead Golf Club.

An Illinois native who played Division I golf at Arkansas State, Lieving was playing in a company tournament that day — her first time touching her clubs in over six months. During that 2021 round, she hit a drive about 320 yards and the ball happened to land right next to the green, and beside Eigner, an Indiana native who was working a charity event on the adjacent tee box.

“The first thing I did when I saw him was apologize,” Lieving recalled. “The first thing he said was, ‘Do you always hit it that far?’ Then he told me he wanted to talk to me after the round. I found it interesting, and subtly in the back of my mind, I thought about how when I was younger I’d watch long drive on the Golf Channel with my dad. It was something I was familiar with, but hadn’t thought much about it.”

When the two finally met up at Family Sports Center a few months later, Lieving’s readings stunned Eigner.

That day at the heated range, Lieving’s advanced metrics (168 mph ball speed and 116 club head speed) already would’ve made her a Top 10 women’s player in the world. Eigner pushed her to start competing. After a growth year in 2022 in which Lieving figured out her equipment, she got her own coach and honed her technique, and has been a breakout star as a rookie.

Currently, Lieving’s longest drive at elevation is 375 yards during a WLD event at the Bigfoot Turf Farm. She’s hit 345 yards at sea level, and her current ball speed PR is 183.3 mph, with hopes to soon get to 190. That would put her in rarified air for a woman.

“I believe I have what it takes to be a world champion,” Lieving said. “I just have to stay confident, execute and stay true to my game, because I know that potential is in there.”

While Lieving and Eigner try to crush their way to the top, they’re doing a financial balancing act in a sport where sponsorships are rare and competitors often pay their own way around tour. For Eigner, hosting over 100 charity events a year has become his bread-and-butter, while Lieving is a Denver-area realtor who balances her tour schedule with her business.

Their roundabout journeys are commonplace in a sport that has few full-time pros. The first long drive championship was held in 1974, but the sport didn’t get into the national consciousness until the 2000s, when for two decades the event then known as the Re/Max World Long Drive Championship was broadcast on ESPN. It later became the World Long Drive Championship and moved to Golf Channel. When the pandemic hit, it became the Professional Long Drivers Association, and has since morphed back into WLD.

Along that evolution, the sport’s developed a brand it self-describes as golf at “full throttle.” WLD features drivers that are USGA legal, but are a couple inches longer than the average club.

“I’ve never met a golfer who said they hit it too far,” joked Lieving’s coach and WLD longtimer Bobby Peterson. “Golf is hard enough, but long drive is this intense pursuit of how far you can push your body to gain speed and power and distance. It’s more adrenaline-packed than golf is, which is keep calm and stay in the moment, and that can be fun. But I never get the thrill from playing golf that I do in long drive.”

Besides Lieving and Eigner, two other locals could make noise at the world championships.

Josh Cassaday, a notable trick shot artist in the charity golf world, is ranked No. 65 in the open division and capable of a deep run with a 220-plus mph ball speed. Plus, Jared Foerter is ranked No. 52, and has the raw talent to be in the mix despite a 210-mph ball speed.

Vegas favorite Kyle Berkshire is ranked No. 1 and has won three of the last four years, and No. 2 Martin Borgmeier is the defending champ. The final three rounds of match play for the open division and women’s division will be broadcast on Golf Channel on Sunday, Oct. 22 starting at noon MT. Eigner, a regular Joe in the sport turned bonafide competitor, hopes to be among the heavyweights hammering drives that day.

“I wouldn’t consider myself someone who has naturally picked this up or someone who has a knack for hitting the ball far,” Eigner said. “I’ve overcome a lot of bad habits in my swing by working hard, and it’s taken a long time to realize those improvements. But that’s what is really rewarding about this sport.”

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That felt like centuries ago, the Crimson Tide golfer starting the tournament at 5 over par after only seven holes. He had looked unrecognizable Monday. Match play was a much more familiar image of Dunlap. The ninth-ranked amateur stampeded through the field, starting with top-ranked Gordon Sargent and all leading to the 15th hole Sunday at Cherry Hills Country Club. Dunlap only needed a two-putt to clinch the title. To clinch history.

“We talked about it all week,” he said afterward, the Havemeyer Trophy glistening at his side.

Dunlap, a 19-year-old from Huntsville, Alabama, completed his remarkable turnaround in Denver by becoming the second golfer in history to win both the U.S. Junior Amateur and the U.S. Amateur championships. His only company is Tiger Woods.

“I think it’s only a third of what he’s done,” Dunlap said, grinning.

He knows his stuff. Woods three-peated at the U.S. Junior Amateur (1991-93), then three-peated again the next three years at U.S. Amateur, the biggest stage in non-professional golf.

But if anything, that amplifies the magnitude of Dunlap’s achievement rather than diminishing it. Woods is the ultimate pillar of golf greatness for Dunlap’s generation. That nobody could replicate even “a third” of Woods’ dominance until now is a testament to the parity that has persisted in the sport for years. Standing out is tough.

Dunlap did it by defeating Neal Shipley in the final, a grueling match in which Shipley couldn’t have played much better in the morning round. He erased a two-hole deficit to tie Dunlap with a birdie on the 18th. Dunlap had much to think about as he took his lunch break.

Tiger was a symbol of his aspiration all week. No different at this critical juncture.

“I don’t think you can tell yourself not to think about it,” Dunlap said. “I think it’s there. I think all you can really do is embrace it.”

He talked with a sports psychologist throughout the week to help him find a balance in a tense atmosphere — “the most pressure I’ve ever been under,” as Dunlap called it. He has synthesized multiple effective strategies, from Tiger to self-antagonization.

“To be honest with you, I try to trick myself into thinking people don’t think I can win,” he said. “It doesn’t take much to get me fired up at all. I will grab onto things that people may not even mean. And I will use that to my advantage, as if they were trying to insult me.”

Equally helpful was the yin to that psychological yang: Dunlap’s caddy and longtime mentor Jeff Curl supplies him with pep talks and positive reinforcement before almost every swing. Curl also penned a message to his pupil Monday during the uncharacteristic slump.

“Jeff wrote something in his yardage book and then showed me. It said some words that I can’t say,” Dunlap said. “But he said, ‘If you snap out of it, this could be something really special.'”

The teenager snapped out of it. He birdied on the eighth hole.

He went on to birdie 12 times on Championship Sunday. The defining stretch against Shipley arrived in the first 10 holes of the afternoon round, which started in a deadlock after that hour-long break. Dunlap won four of the 10 holes.

But even a lead that’s considered comfortable by onlookers can feel insecure in the mind of the competitor chasing history. Shipley won the 31st hole, finding a glimmer of hope and momentum. The messy 32nd hole that followed felt designed to benefit his comeback bid; both golfers landed themselves in the rough with their second shots. Dunlap’s first attempt to chip his ball out of the rough and over the small hill blocking him from the hole went haywire; the ball rolled back to the edge of the green, a net gain of less than 10 feet. The door was open for Shipley to pull within two.

Dunlap needed only remember how close he was to history. Or how reliable he is in match play: He had won 29 of his previous 31, dating back multiple years.

“I think I have a mindset for match play,” Dunlap said.

His next putt cleared the hill and positioned himself to finish the job. Meanwhile, Shipley missed a 4-foot putt. Dunlap escaped the hole with a win — back up four — despite his own bogey.

A two-putt was all he needed on the next one to clinch the title.

As he embraced his caddy, Curl called out: “That’s history, baby!”

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It felt like the return of primetime golf in Colorado — and possibly a prelude for something much greater.

Since the last men’s major was held in Colorado in 1985, the state’s hosted plenty of notable golf tournaments such as the U.S. Amateur. But the fact remains it’s been 38 years since that ’85 PGA Championship at Cherry Hills, and 45 years since the club held the third of the state’s three U.S. Opens.

So what gives with the state’s major drought? And does Colorado, a cold-weather state with an above-average golf appetite, have a chance to land another major amid its decades-long absence from the game’s biggest stage?

“Absolutely Colorado has a shot to land a U.S. Open,” said Jim Hillary, a Cherry Hills member and the championship chairman for the 123rd U.S. Amateur. “And it has a good shot, in a lot of people’s opinion.”

The wait’s just going to be a while.

The U.S. Open is realistically the only major the state has a chance at now that the PGA Championship is played in May, instead of August. The threat of snow during Colorado’s notoriously unpredictable springs is likely too big of a risk for the PGA of America.

But there are only seven openings for the U.S. Open in the next 28 years, with the tournament booked out as far as 2051. The soonest available slot is in 13 years, 2036, and then ’38 and ’40 after that.

The good news for Colorado is that the state has a strong relationship with the USGA, the entity that stages the U.S. Open. This year’s U.S. Amateur was the 34th USGA championship conducted in Colorado, and 10th at Cherry Hills. The U.S. Amateur is a good bet to return to Cherry Hills for a fourth time at some point down the line.

“The USGA has a long history of coming to Colorado and some of the game’s greatest champions have earned their national championship in this state,” USGA chief championships officer John Bodenhamer said. “We love Colorado, and there’s more to come.”

In addition to The International, a PGA Tour tournament staged at Castle Pines Golf Club from 1986-06, Colorado’s hosted senior opens, U.S. Women’s Opens, mid-amateurs and the BMW Championship (returning to Castle Pines in 2024) over the course of its major drought.

A central factor in the absence of a men’s major in Colorado since 1985 is the state’s elevation. Golf changed drastically since Hubert Green prevailed at that ’85 PGA Championship, and the combination of long drives and advanced club technology make Colorado a less-than-ideal place to challenge the world’s best.

“It’s hard to get over (the elevation stigma),” said Steven Bartkowski, the executive director of the PGA Colorado Section. “The average PGA Tour event is about 7,200 yards at sea level, so if you think about that from a Colorado standpoint, and you consider about a 10% difference (that needs to be accounted for), that’s 7,900, 8,000 yards.”

Bodenhamer said Colorado’s elevation “is not a concern, but it’s a consideration” during the USGA’s evaluation process, which looks at a slew of criteria when choosing championship venues.

In Colorado, there’s a short list of clubs that meet USGA’s standards in terms of design, toughness, credibility, history, corporate/marketing support and the infrastructure needed to host an event of the U.S. Open’s magnitude.

Cherry Hills, Castle Pines (site of next year’s BMW Championship) and Colorado Golf Club, the co-host venue for this week’s U.S. Amateur, top that list — although infrastructure would be a challenge at all three.

Cherry Hills brass point to the 2014 BMW Championship held at the club, as well as this week’s tournament, as evidence that the area’s premier courses wouldn’t be easily conquered in a U.S. Open.

“Look at 2014, when the course was pretty dry and played pretty tricky, and you had guys like Rory (McIlroy) four-putting,” Cherry Hills president Kim Koehen said. “And this week, the young players can hit it a long way, but they still had to put it in play, avoid thick rough and putt well on fast, tricky greens.

“The fact that the cut for the match-play round was plus-one for two days of stroke play (in this week’s U.S. Amateur), that says both Cherry Hills and Colorado Golf Club held up very well.”

Cherry Hills played to a yardage of 7,394 yards this week, while Colorado Golf Club was 7,560. Castle Pines can be stretched to about 8,000 yards. Unforgiving rough and difficult greens can help offset the elevation advantage at all three venues.

A couple other courses outside the Big 3 could warrant a look by the USGA as well, especially if the association elects to go with a surprise pick at a relatively new course for the U.S. Open, as they did in 2015 (Chambers Bay in Washington) and ’17 (Erin Hills in Wisconsin).

Two Colorado courses that might fit that outlier billing are RainDance in Windsor and TPC Colorado in Berthoud. Though location relative to the Denver metro could be considered a drawback for both, each checks several boxes.

At 8,400 yards, RainDance is the longest course in North America. It opened last year and continues to build up its property, including a hotel. Meanwhile, TPC Colorado can be stretched to 7,991 yards and already hosts an annual Korn Ferry tournament.

“While we like the old tried-and-true where history has been made, we certainly keep an open mind to any venues that we think would deliver on our strategies,” Bodenhamer said. “That could definitely be a new course.”

Still, Cherry Hills — with its close ties to the USGA and longstanding history — remains the heavy favorite to eventually land another U.S. Open.

“We think of the greatest venues in America as the cathedrals of the game,” Bodenhamer said. “Cherry Hills is a cathedral, make no mistake about it.”

The club hosted the first U.S. Open west of the Mississippi in 1938, and its first PGA Championship three years after that. But its signature moment came in 1960 as the host of the U.S. Open that ushered golf into its modern era. In that tournament, Arnold Palmer famously drove the first green en route to erasing a seven-shot deficit on the final day to beat aging legend Ben Hogan and up-and-comer Jack Nicklaus, who finished second.

Hillary said that history is not lost on players, who value the course they win a U.S. Open on nearly as much as the trophy itself.

“The lessons of history from a given course suggests that in future championships, more great history can be made, and that it’s not by accident that magic happens,” Hillary said. “And there’s a history of great champions here. We have Palmer, Nicklaus, Andy North, Hubert Green, Phil Mickelson, Babe Didrikson Zaharias.”

Cherry Hills, which has a requirement to host championship tournaments written within its bylaws, is intent on capitalizing on its prestigious standing in order to secure one of the handful of open slots for the U.S. Open over the next quarter-century.

Hence the club’s Championships Committee, whose sole focus is “to try to attract the most important events in the world,” committee and club member Dave Lee explained. The committee, which features Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning and former PGA Tour star David Duval, met with Bodenhamer on Friday to discuss the possibility of a U.S. Open at Cherry Hills.

“Rest assured we’re pursuing (a U.S. Open bid), and we’re doing everything we can to see that happen,” Lee said. “And no matter what happens with that, championship golf is our history, and will continue to be.”

In the meantime, those within the game here remind local fans to relish the action in front of them, even if the state doesn’t currently have an annual PGA event or a future major to look forward to yet.

“There’s been many of us who tried to bring a men’s senior tournament or a women’s annual tournament here since The International went away in ’07, and it’s not for the lack of trying, it just hasn’t worked out,” said Kevin Laura, the president of Green Valley Ranch Golf Club and CEO of the Colorado Open Golf Foundation.

“But remember, just recently or ahead, we had the U.S. Girls Junior Championship this year at Eisenhower Golf Course (in Colorado Springs), the U.S. Am, the BMW in ’24, the U.S. Senior Open at The Broadmoor in ’25. We’re not just getting a lick at the lollipop. We’re getting the big tournaments coming here, and that’s big for our state.”

Championship Golf in Colorado

A look at the most notable tournaments played in Colorado dating back to the 1938 U.S. Open at Cherry Hills.

1938 U.S. Open: Ralph Guldahl, Cherry Hills

1941 PGA Championship: Vic Ghezzi, Cherry Hills

1959 U.S. Amateur Championship: Jack Nicklaus, The Broadmoor

1960 U.S. Open: Arnold Palmer, Cherry Hills

1967 PGA Championship: Don January, Columbine

1967 U.S. Amateur Championship: Bob Dickson, The Broadmoor

1976 U.S. Senior Amateur: Lewis Oehmig, Cherry Hills

1978 U.S. Open: Andy North, Cherry Hills

1983 U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship: Jay Sigel, Cherry Hills

1985 PGA Championship: Hubert Green, Cherry Hills

1990 U.S. Amateur Championship: Phil Mickelson, Cherry Hills

1993 U.S. Senior Open: Jack Nicklaus, Cherry Hills

1995 U.S. Women’s Open: Annika Sörenstam, The Broadmoor

2005 U.S. Women’s Open: Birdie Kim, Cherry Hills

2008 U.S. Senior Open: Eduardo Romero, The Broadmoor

2011 U.S. Women’s Open: So Yeon Ryu, The Broadmoor

2012 U.S. Amateur Championship: Steven Fox, Cherry Hills

2014 BMW Championship: Billy Horschel, Cherry Hills

2018 U.S. Senior Open: David Toms, The Broadmoor

2019 U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship: Lukas Michel, Colorado GC

2023 U.S. Amateur Championship: Nick Dunlap/Neal Shipley, Cherry Hills

2024 BMW Championship: TBD, Castle Pines

Future U.S. Open Sites

A look at future sites for the U.S. Open as announced by the USGA; the closest opening is 2036. 

2024: Pinehurst

2025: Oakmont CC

2026: Shinnecock Hills GC

2027: Pebble Beach

2028: Winged Foot GC

2029: Pinehurst

2030: Merion GC

2031: Riviera CC

2032: Pebble Beach

2033: Oakmont CC

2034: Oakland Hills CC

2035: Pinehurst

2036: TBD

2037: Pebble Beach

2038: TBD

2039: Los Angeles CC

2040: TBD

2041: Pinehurst

2042: Oakmont CC

2043: TBD

2044: Pebble Beach

2045: TBD

2046: TBD

2047: Pinehurst

2048: TBD

2049: Oakmont CC

2050: Merion GC

2051: Oakland Hills CC

“Mr. Palmer is an awesome figure,” Neal Shipley said Saturday after beating John Marshall Butler 2&1 to advance to the championship round of the U.S. Amateur at Cherry Hills Country Club.

Shipley grew up in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, fewer than 50 miles as the crow flies from Latrobe, where this hoity-toity sport’s original champion of the people was born.

Newsflash: No male golfer from western Pennsylvania has won the U.S. Amateur since 1954.

Any guesses who that might have been?

“Who would that have been? Jay Sigel?” Shipley asked.

Excellent guess. But Sigel is from the wrong end of the Keystone State.

The answer is Palmer, beloved as the King.

Shipley is embraced for being a regular dude.

He was ranked on the outskirts of the top 1,000 among the world’s amateur golfers only a year ago. This 22-year-old competitor is built a little like Charles Barkley, but grips it and rips it more like John Daly.

To steal my favorite line from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” he seems to be very popular with the gallery. The sportos, the motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, dweebies … They all adore him.

Didn’t matter if you drove daddy’s Tesla or took an RTD bus to Cherry Hills, Shipley was da man you rooted for on this sizzling summer afternoon.

And make no mistake. He felt their love while rallying from down in his semifinal match against Butler, finally taking the lead on the 16th hole.

“It seems like the crowd likes me,” Shipley said. “I’m trying to use that energy when I hit good golf shots … keep good vibes going.”

The lovin’ feeling is important in a match-play tourney that requires the bumping and grinding of a half dozen head-to-head victories to win this championship. How do I put this? If the relationship between spectators and players at the U.S. Am was any more intimate, everybody would have to get a room.

And that’s a beautiful thing.

The crowd at Cherry Hills on Saturday was 2,700. OK, maybe that’s a far cry from a Taylor Swift concert, but what makes this tourney so freakin’ awesome is that the crowd can walk straight down the fairway alongside the competitors.

At some point, each and every one of the fans seemed to be close enough to reach out and touch Shipley, including Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning, who followed him for several holes midway through the round.

“He was someone I watched beat up on my Steelers,” Shipley said.

I’ve been blessed to serve as an eyewitness to a lot of great stuff in nearly 40 years of covering sports for The Denver Post, from John Elway imitating a helicopter at the Super Bowl to Nikola Jokic sharing a championship with his daughter.

But one of the coolest moments I’ve experienced took place Saturday at the 553-yard 17th hole, famous far and wide for being the first island green on a par-5 in American golf.

Up one hole in the match on Butler, Shipley grabbed a wedge and stood 93 yards from the pin to take his third shot. I stood maybe 15 feet away from him, alongside hundreds of his new BFFs.

Like a magician waving a wand, Shipley took dead aim with his wedge, spun the ball and watched the wizardry unfold.

The shot stuck one inch from the cup. This match belonged to the Righteous Dude.

The crowd engulfed him, offering fist bumps, momentarily turning a small piece of the hallowed grounds at Cherry Hills into a raucous mosh pit.

“Everyone was going crazy,” Shipley said. “I was going crazy.”

Way back on Aug. 11, competitors at the U.S. Amateur gathered on the first tee at Cherry Hills before their practice rounds, given the chance to re-create an iconic shot by the King.

Palmer won the 1960 U.S. Open at this same track, rallying from seven shots back to overcome the great Ben Hogan. The moment that made unforgettable history was the King boldly driving the par-4 first hole at the outset of the final round.

He did it the old-school way, with a classic persimmon club.

These young bucks at the U.S. Am were granted a chance to match Palmer with the same antiquated persimmon technology. Any guesses for the only current competitor able to reach the green with a persimmon driver in that exhibition, with nothing at stake except bragging rights?

“I was the only one,” Shipley said.

He’s now 36 holes away from the championship, although talented Nick Dunlap stands in his way as the prohibitive favorite.

But I wouldn’t put anything past a dude who drove the No. 1 green, just like Arnie did.

“That was a real cool way to start off the week,” said Shipley, before admitting: “I never thought the week would end up like this.”

Long hair flowing behind him, he walks in the footsteps of the King, feeling no fear.

With the Righteous Dude, it’s good vibes only.

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Semifinal Results

Nick Dunlap def. Parker Bell, 3 and 2 — Dunlap was down a hole early, but just as he did in his comeback win in the quarters, he owned the back nine, winning Nos. 9, 12 and 15 en route to the victory. Dunlap is now 29-2 in match play since 2021.

Neal Shipley def. John Marshall Butler, 2 and 1 — Shipley dropped two of the first three holes, won Nos. 4 and 5 to pull even, then was three down entering the 11th. He won five of the last seven holes, including a tap-in birdie on No. 17 to seal it.

The Finalists

Nick Dunlap

19, Huntsville, Ala.; No. 9 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings, No. 41 seed

Dunlap’s run this week should come as no surprise, considering he’s competing in his eighth USGA championship and fourth U.S. Amateur. A member of the 2023 USA Walker Cup Team, Dunlap’s already played in two U.S. Opens. He was an All-American as a freshman at Alabama, earning first-team All-SEC honors. He’s had a scorching summer leading into his performance at Cherry Hills, as he posted consecutive wins at the Northeast Amateur and North & South Amateur. Dunlap took down the world’s top-ranked amateur, Gordon Sargent, in the Round of 64 and beat local Connor Jones in the Round of 32. He cruised by Bowen Mauss (5 and 3) in the Round of 16, then he won over Jackson Koivun in 19 holes in the quarters.

Neal Shipley

22, Pittsburgh; No. 132 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings, No. 47 seed

Competing in his second U.S. Amateur, Shipley played three seasons at James Madison University before transferring to Ohio State for this past season. He’s been knocking on the door of a big tournament win this summer but hasn’t quite gotten there: He was runner-up in the Sunnehanna Amateur and the Trans-Mississippi Amateur, where he lost in a playoff, and also tied for second in the Dogwood Invitational and tied for third in the Pacific Coast Amateur. In addition to his comeback in the semifinals, Shipley gritted out close wins over Wenyi Ding in the Round of 64 (one up), Calum Scott in the Round of 32 (20 holes), Cooper Jones in the Round of 16 (3 and 2), and Andi Xu in the quarterfinals (2 and 1) by erasing an early deficit.

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It was only after he buried a long birdie putt on 19 — a playoff hole — that he unleashed a fist pump and yell befitting of the moment. It was, by far, his biggest show of emotion on Friday and a rare window into his steely approach.

With that putt, and Jackson Koivun’s subsequent miss, Dunlap punched his ticket to Saturday’s match play semifinals of the U.S. Amateur Championship at Cherry Hills Country Club. There, he’ll face Parker Bell.

.@AlabamaMGolf's Nick Dunlap drills a long birdie putt on the first playoff hole to win the match vs. Jackson Koivun and advance to the semifinals.

: #USAmateur on @peacock pic.twitter.com/kBNX73S6j6

— Golf Channel (@GolfChannel) August 18, 2023

“Roll Tide, Nick!” yelled one of the many spectators congratulating Alabama’s Dunlap, knowing that he’d knocked off Koivun, who happens to be a freshman at Auburn.

Crimson Tide and Tiger hats littered the gallery among the hundreds watching Friday morning. Even Broncos legend John Elway walked a few holes on the back nine watching the two teenagers compete.

Sporting bags from their respective schools, Dunlap said the rivalry crossed his mind but he was more focused on the quality of his opponent.

“Somebody told me yesterday he was the No. 1 junior in the world, and you obviously had to do some pretty impressive things to get there, and I respect the heck out of that,” Dunlap said.

“… But I treat everybody the same,” he said. “Anybody can go out and shoot anywhere from 10-over to 10-under. You never know.”

Dunlap had a chance to advance on the 18th hole, where spectators surrounded the green by the clubhouse. When his putt ran long, it all but sealed a playoff.

“It’s just part of it,” he said. “Same thing with 16. You walk to 17 tee and let 16 bother you, you’re going to be 1-down going into 18. You’ve got to block it out as quick as you can.”

Dunlap, No. 9 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking, conceded he wasn’t reading the greens like he wanted before his signature moment.

“I didn’t make much all day,” he said. “I’m normally pretty good inside 10 feet, and I missed two coming down the stretch. That’ll shake you up a little bit.”

But he stepped in and shot with confidence.

After securing his spot in the semifinals, including coming back from two holes down on the front nine, Dunlap floated the idea that he might go get some more work in on his short game.

“You never know, you may come out and make them all tomorrow,” he said. “Golf is a weird game. I think it goes to show the last couple holes we played.”

As Dunlap remained in contention for the Amateur title, he remained locked into his objective of winning the weekend.

“I think you can get overwhelmed by the situation quickly if you allow yourself to,” the precocious 19-year-old said. “At the end of the day, it’s still golf. You still have to stick to your game plan, no matter what that is, whether it’s trying to push it down the fairway with driver, 3-wood or lay back with irons. The golf ball doesn’t know who’s hitting it. That’s kind of been my game plan the entire way.”

Before this week, he said he’d never been to Colorado. When he arrived, the altitude greeted him with a pounding headache for a couple of days due to dehydration.

And his impression now?

“I like hitting (my) driver 380,” he said with a smile.

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Quit? No way. On a hot summer night in Georgia three years ago, surrender was not a viable option, because it would mean taking the walk of shame alongside an identical twin who had battled to be first since the day both these fierce competitors greeted this world from the womb.

So David and Maxwell Ford dueled with putters, their home golf course in Atlanta empty except for them and the moon.

“It was like 9:20 p.m., almost pitch black, and we stayed out there and kept putting. Nobody wanted to be the first to leave,” David said Thursday, recalling a putting contest with the intensity of a sword fight.

But all these years after a winner was grudgingly declared, is it finally safe to let the sibling-rivalry truth be known?

“I don’t know if David would tell you this, but I was way down in that putting contest, And when we compete, whoever’s losing is not happy. I’m the one that didn’t want to leave. I figured if I stayed out there long enough, I had to win one time,” Maxwell confessed, as we stood outside the clubhouse at Cherry Hills Country Club.

The 123rd U.S. Amateur Championship is being contested this week on the same hallowed grounds where Arnold Palmer led the charge of his raucous army by overcoming a seven-stroke deficit to win the 1960 U.S. Open. And you can bet Phil Mickelson was delighted when he took home the U.S. Am trophy from Colorado in 1990.

If I’m reading my golf history correctly, tradition suggests that once every generation, a generational talent leaves his imprint on Cherry Hills. But this week, the U.S. Am threatened to become a family barbecue.

The weather? Scorching. And the Ford brothers? Sizzling. Against a field featuring more than 300 of the best young players in the sport, David and Maxwell awoke Thursday needing two match play victories apiece to hold their own private putting contest at this prestigious tournament.

“When the bracket came out, my family sat down and figured out we could play in the quarterfinals,” Maxwell said.

For 21 years, it’s been almost impossible to separate David and Maxwell, much less tell them apart on the putting green in the moonlight. Helpful hint: Maxwell is right-handed; while David is a lefty. They are the two males in a set of triplets; rambunctious boys who grew up playing roller hockey and basketball as teammates until they simultaneously fell hard for their father’s love of golf as teenagers.

After a 10-minute chat with each of them, however, you begin to discover guys that have been mirror images since conception did grow into their own skin as distinctly different southern gentlemen.

In the center of the fairway, in the heat of competition, David seeks peace.

“I have scripture from the Bible going through my head, before every shot, when I’m behind the ball: Psalms 37:23-24,” he said, citing verses that could’ve been written for golfers that inevitably find the rough: The Lord makes firm the steps of the one that delights in him. Though he may stumble, he will not fall …

On the other hand, when Maxwell tees up the ball, he has a hankering to wrassle, with no holds barred.

“I love everything about golf … except maybe bogeys,” he told me. “And I really, really like being in contention, because my body likes it and usually performs well. Adrenaline makes me more locked in. My misses are smaller. In match play, it’s like you’re tied for the lead every single time you go to the first tee. It’s a fight or flight thing for me.”

During any given round, golf can be a good walk spoiled. But on this breezy, bone-dry day in Denver, the U.S. Am was a marathon, requiring the survivors to endure 36 holes capable of messing with any competitor from the doubts in his head to the bottom of his blistering toes.

David, ranked fourth in the world amateur rankings, cruised during his morning match, scoring a 5-and-4 knockout of Grant Smith from Iowa. Maxwell pulled an upset with a 3-and-2 victory over Nick Gabrelcik, the 10th-ranked amateur in the world,

This sport, however, was invented to remind us nobody’s perfect.

During his afternoon match, nothing went right for Maxwell after taking the first hole from Parker Bell, and he fell 5-and-4 in the Round of 16. David found himself in a dogfight with Ben James, ranked sixth among the world’s amateurs.

With Maxwell encouraging him from the gallery, David found the rough with a 3-iron off the tee on No. 18, surrendered a one-hole advantage and lost the match when James birdied the first extra hole.

The first guy there to console David as he walked off the green? His brother.

“Good playing,” Maxwell said. “Proud of you.”.

On the long walk back to the clubhouse, the Ford brothers walked in lockstep.

Inseparable. As always. In victory or defeat.

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Speaking at practically a word per millisecond, and even briefly mistaking the 123rd U.S. Amateur Championship for something a little bigger — “Augusta … er, not Augusta,” he called it at one point — Brown was still brimming with enthusiasm Wednesday after three and a half hours of match play at Cherry Hills County Club.

With good reason: Brown is only 16. Makes sense that he would wield outsized ambition with a bright future in front of him, especially after he made history Tuesday on the biggest stage of his budding career. Brown is the youngest co-medalist at stroke play in U.S. Amateur history, breaking a 103-year-old record previously held by Bob Jones. He was 18.

Up three at the halfway point of his Round of 64 matchup, then suddenly tied after 16 holes, Brown pulled out a victory over Benton Weinberg thanks to a birdie on the 17th. Who was on his mind afterward?

“Jack Niklaus played basketball,” Brown was saying. “I think he was an All-American as well. I mean, I’m not an All-American. But I think he was an All-American. (Nicklaus was an All-State honorable mention in Ohio.) Which, I kind of saw the parallels.

“Jack Nicklaus played basketball. I play basketball. He played golf. I play golf. OK, maybe someday I’ll turn out like Jack Nicklaus.”

Not a bad reason for Brown to stick with his first sport, even as golf becomes his potential money-maker. The Nashville-area teenager’s mom is Rhonda Brown, who played college hoops at Vanderbilt and made the first 3-pointer in WNBA history during a brief career in the pros.

Blades was schooled in basketball as much as golf while growing up. His older sister, Millie, was his mom’s original protégé. Millie made more than 220 3-pointers in high school and led their school to a state championship in 2018. She plays at UNC Ashville now. Blades’ No. 1 childhood mission was “to be as good of a shooter as my sister is.”

He joined the high school basketball team as a freshman last year, playing mostly for the freshmen and junior varsity squads. He doesn’t want the sport to fade out of his life, but the time commitment to golf is increasing. Whether or not he finishes high school on a competitive stage, he hopes to keep playing recreationally with friends to stay in shape.

“I’m more of a point guard,” he said. “I can touch rim. I can’t dunk. … I like to shoot it.”

That’s a fitting profile for an athlete whose passion and motivation for golf stems from a moment when he was 8 years old: “I was on the range and I flushed a shot,” Blades recalled. The feeling it gave him was addictive. “I strive to get that every single time now.” He didn’t start playing in competitive golf tournaments until about a year later, he estimates. The rise has been meteoric since.

He had, however, held a golf club in his hand from a young age. While Blades’ mom introduced basketball, his dad inspired him toward golf — and still does. Blades says his father has only ever missed two of his tournaments despite a leukemia diagnosis. “Having him here is awesome,” Blades said. “… Just having him here at this tournament. I remember when I qualified, he was like, ‘My son is going to … the U.S. Amateur.’ What dad can say that after thinking that they were going to die?”

With symbolism powering Blades forward in both sports — reminders of his love for each parent — he naturally has sought deeper meaning in how the two sports service each other. He believes his golf benefits from his basketball, that the two are philosophically similar even though one is known as one of the fastest-paced sports, and the other is the most methodical.

“I think, like Michael Jordan, you just step up and shoot,” Blades said, citing another all-time great athlete. “That’s kind of like in golf. Like, I’m over a 6-foot putt. I’m not trying to analytically read the putt. Let’s just get up there and putt it. Get up and shoot.”

The teenager’s chances of landing in Jordan territory are exponentially slimmer than his chances of becoming a Nicklaus-esque golfer, but that won’t stop him from invoking MJ.

Blades’ name is easy to remember, and the 2023 U.S. Amateur has been an indicator that it might grow into a familiar name someday. Fittingly, both of his parents played a part in it. When his mom debuted in the WNBA, she was Rhonda Blades. The maiden name was passed down as a first name.

“My dad was like, ‘If we ever have a son, we have to name him Blades.’ And now I’m here,” he said. “I’ve kind of gotten used to it. But I remember thinking back, like, ‘Blades, that’s not a bad name.'”

No, the Eaglecrest High School grad and CSU standout didn’t make the cut to match play. But the waterworks from his caddy — dad, Matt — were a warranted signal of one golf chapter closing for Bryant, and another soon opening.

Tuesday marked the last day of amateur competition for Bryant, who is turning pro and will make his debut in September in the pre-qualifying stage of the Korn Ferry Tour Q-School.

“Once I tapped in the last putt, so many great amateur memories ran through my mind,” Davis Bryant said. “It was a special week to get the opportunity to play in (a second) U.S. Amateur, even though I’m disappointed I didn’t perform the way I wanted to.

“Dad did what he needed to on my bag, I just didn’t quite execute quite right on a few shots. But I relished every moment out here with him, just like I always do.”

Bryant finished at six-over after carding a two-over 73 on Tuesday at Cherry Hills Country Club, putting him six shots back of the cutline of even par to advance to Wednesday’s round-of-64 match play.

That didn’t take the shine off the week for Matt Bryant, who also caddied for his daughter, Emma, in last week’s U.S. Women’s Amateur at Bel Air Country Club in Los Angeles. Emma, a junior at the University of Denver, also missed the cut in her USGA championship debut. Matt’s been the coach/caddie for both players for their entire careers.

“I couldn’t ask for much more from these kids,” Matt Bryant, the longtime Director of Golf/GM at Green Valley Ranch Golf Club, said through tears. “And back-to-back weeks at the U.S. Am? I couldn’t ask for two better weeks on the bag.”

Emma was one of about 40 supporters in her brother’s gallery over the past two days, and she and her brother have become influencers on each other’s careers. The brother and sister won Class 5A state titles in the same school year while at Eaglecrest — Davis as a senior in the fall of 2017 and Emma as a freshman in the spring of 2018 — and grew close since.

“I’ve learned a lot from him,” Emma said. “I’ve always been compared to him my whole life, so at first that was hard, but as I grew up, I realized how grateful I am to be his sister. We chip together, putt together, play together. (In training) he knows what can get me going, but knows not to push it. And we always have fun together on the course.”

Bryant’s been on a hot streak lately. He finished his five-year Rams career with the second-best stroke average (71.95) in program history. He was a three-time All-Mountain West Conference selection. And as a graduate student this year, he had a 71.67 stroke average, including two runner-ups and finishing in the top 30 of 11 of his 13 tournaments.

“He’s been playing well for a while now, but this year he wanted to go out with a bang,” CSU golf coach Michael Wilson said. “(That attitude) showed up every day. He has big hopes and dreams and he wants and expects to win. That’s going to translate to the next level.”

While Bryant’s pro plans are set for later this year, he’s also got a backup plan. He is finishing up his masters in sports management this summer and will be a graduate assistant coach for the Rams in the fall.

He said coaching is “plan B” if his pro career doesn’t pan out.

“I’m going to have that in my back pocket if I need to,” Bryant said. “But I want to give this a shot first. I believe I can do it.”

Day 2 notes: Blades Brown, a 16-year-old from Nashville, finished seven-under to join 22-year-old Chinese golfer Sampson Zheng (Cal) and 21-year-old Jackson Buchanan (Illinois/Dacula, Ga) as the co-medalists of the stroke play round. Brown, a two-time Tennessee high school state champion, is the youngest co-medalist in tournament history. Brown’s already made waves this year, winning the Tennessee Junior Amateur by 12 strokes and also taking fifth in the Tennessee State Open… Connor Jones (Mountain Range/Colorado State) carded a one-under at Cherry Hills to finish at five-under in stroke play, giving him the No. 9 seed. Unlike Bryant, Jones does have a year of college eligibility left, and he plans to use it… Top-ranked amateur Gordon Sargent (Vanderbilt/Birmingham, Ala.) finished three-under, and got the No. 24 seed… Colorado Springs native Colin Prater, an assistant golf coach for Cheyenne Mountain High School, also made the cut by finishing at one-under with a four-under day at Colorado Golf Club. He and Jones are the only two of the nine Colorado golfers in the tournament to advance to match play. Prater is the No. 46 seed.

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