4 minute read
Fabulous Ferris
Ferris rides Route 66 to stunning Amateur victory
By Dan O’Neill You couldn’t help but feel a bit for Chris Kovach. Greg Norman would have recognized his pain, Arnold Palmer might have commiserated. After all, Norman couldn’t hold a six-shot lead on the final day of the 1996 Masters. Palmer had a seven-shot advantage with nine holes to play at the 1966 U.S. Open, and finished second. The sometimes maddening truth is, golf will do that to you. One moment you’re on top of the world, the next you’re in the abyss. This fact was not lost on Kovach, who was marvelous in opening an eight-shot lead going into the final round of the Metropolitan Amateur at Meadowbrook Country Club. But on Saturday, Aug. 8, Kovach watched it melt away, his lead and the championship. And when it was over, even in his disappointment, he understood the bottom line: “That’s golf.” You couldn’t help but feel for him … unless you were Chris Ferris. “No,” Ferris said, after tapping in for a championshipclinching par on the final hole of the 54-hole championship. It was the first time Ferris had the lead and, frankly, the
only time it mattered. “I mean I’ve had my share of leads and had that happen,” Ferris added. “The way I look at it, nobody’s leading until the 54 holes are over. I was just focused on me beating the golf course. I mean, I never thought about (Kovach). That’s golf. It can be a lonely game. You don’t win a lot, so when you do, you have to enjoy it.” You couldn’t blame Ferris. And if you felt empathy for Kovach, you could only marvel at Ferris. Thirty years ago, Hale Irwin came from eight shots back on the final day of the 1990 U.S. Open and won the championship in a playoff - becoming the oldest winner (45) in U.S. Open history. Ferris knew it could be done, but only if he ignored everything else and focused on his own game. As a soccer fan, Ferris has adopted the words of Liverpool coach Jurgen Klopp. “He said. ‘You got to go from doubter to believer at some point,’ ” Ferris said. In the final round at Meadowbrook, he did just that. Kovach didn’t hold his big lead, but it would be wrong to suggest he gave it away. His 4-over-par 76 final round was not his best, but not a score that normally would yield eight
Ferris rides Route 66 to stunning Amateur victory
shots. He finished 4-under par for the championship, good enough to win a lot of Metropolitan Amateurs. It just wasn’t good enough to win this one, not when the person in pursuit shoots a final-round 66 and finishes 6 under. “At the end of the day,” Kovach added, “if someone would have told me I was 1-over on the day with two to play, I would have thought I had a four or five-shot lead. But he played awesome, He came out and earned it.” In the final pairing, Ferris didn’t chase Kovach, he hunted him down. Ferris’ front nine featured six birdies, including four in succession from Nos. 5 through 8. By the time the players turned, it was a horse race, with only a two-shot gap. When Kovach birdied the 14th, the lead was three with four holes to play and the predictabe outcome seemed restored. But Ferris responded by birdying the par-5 15th, making the margin two with three to play. Both player missed the par-3 green at No. 17. But while Kovach two-putted for bogey, Ferris took a drop and then holed his chip for an improbable birdie. The two went to 18 knotted. It was the second chip-in of the tournament for
Ferris, who also holed out from the fairway twice. At the 18th, both players missed the fairway. But Kovach’s miss was worse, leaving him stymied behind a tree, forcing him to go lateral with a punch-out. Ferris was able to advance from a bunker and land his second just shy of the green. While Kovach could not recover, suffering a double bogey, Ferris chipped up next to the hole. He tapped in for par - a two-shot win secured, a remarkable comeback complete. “To win a 54-hole tournament, that feels really good,” said the returning senior at University of Missouri-St. Louis. “Because I’ve been close in college but I always seem to make some mistakes along the way. I made some mistakes on the first two days, but today not so many. “The thing that was key all week is I kept my emotions in check. I was really calm, nothing seemed to phase me a whole lot.” The victory also completed a dynamic double for Ferris. Twice previously he won the Metropolitan Junior Amateur. “This is the biggest win of my career,” Ferris said. “It feels pretty good.”
1 Chris Ferris -6 2 Chris Kovach -4 3 Frankie Thomas 1 T4 Brad Carpenter 2 T4 Chad Niezing 2 T6 Max Kreikemeier 4 T6 Shawn Jasper 4 T6 R. Berkmeyer 4 T9 Alex Locke 5 T9 Crimson Callahan 5 T11 Drew Pranger 6 T11 Max Floyd 6 T11 Sam Migdal 6 T14 Michael Ehlers 8 T14 Bryan Bohme 8 T16 W. Postlethwaite 9 T16 Drew Lilly 9 T16 Steven Shuert 9 T16 Ryan Sullivan 9 T16 Patrick Britt 9 21 Nate McCutcheon 10 T22 Zach Unnerstall 11 T22 Jacob Erickson 11 T22 Tom Vogt 11 T25 Phil Caravia 12 T25 Jason Landry 12 T25 Zach Williams 12 T25 Max Harres 12
