Golf's Longest Day: Notes From Hillcrest
UCLA's Morales medals, three players will return for a Tuesday playoff and 13-year-old Jaden Soong performs incredibly. Plus, scores from the other U.S. Open Final Qualifying sites.
Golf’s Longest Day is over!
Wait, scratch that.
The annoying southern California marine layer wiped away a solid 20 more minutes of playoff time, forcing officials and three players into a Tuesday return to L.A.’s Hillcrest Country Club. The late day gloom also offered a preview of what could happen a week from Thursday should U.S. Open late light get prematurely covered up by those pesky clouds.
In the meantime, Charley Hoffman, Josh Anderson and Preston Summerhays will get to sleep on a 3-for-2 sudden death playoff. They start at 7:30 a.m. and will play over Hillcrest’s 10th-11th-12th and 9th holes until two emerge.
Here’s a wrap of the day from Hillcrest with notes and a roundup of qualifiers from the other nine venues.
Mexico’s Omar Morales recorded 14 birdies over his 36 holes to medal at Hillcrest. A 2023 bright spot for a rebuilding UCLA program, the Puebla, Mexico sophomore started the 2022-23 Bruins season finishing dead last in their opener but ended the year by winning UC Davis’ tournament.
“He’s made massive leaps this year and really has worked hard on the mental side,” said coach Armen Kirakossian, who went most of the way with Morales, with stops to recruit a few juniors in the field.
There were signs of Morales’ game rising to a new level when he recently took the one-spot qualifier for the PGA Tour’s Mexico Open and then missed the cut by a stroke.
Kirakossian is bullish Morales’s ability to handle L.A. North. The UCLA team keeps a running scoreboard in their on campus facility for low-round-for-the-season-at-each of their home courses. Morales currently has the 2023 low at LA North with a 66.
Finishing a stroke behind Morales was Englishman Barclay Brown, one of FOUR Stanford golfers to make it through Golf’s Longest Day.
Carrying his clubs for all 36 at the hilly mid-city club, the graduating Senior and two-time All Pac 12 second team player made 10 birdies and an eagle to get into the U.S. Open.
Another shot back was former Arizona State star and LIV golfer David Puig. Clad in his Torque team gear made 8 birdies in an afternoon 64 and generally acted like a miserable knob when fans gave him words of encouragement. Must be a Torque thing.
Elsewhere his fellow LIVster Brendan Steele missed Tuesday morning’s playoff by a stroke after birdieing his final two holes.
And there was 13-year-old Jaden Soong, who I’ve known since he was six years old after we featured his incredible swing on Golf Channel’s Morning Drive. The Burbank native was featured on all of the local stations and even got some time on ABC’s Good Morning America for his incredible feat of making it to Final Qualifying. And the young lad performed incredible despite making only three birdies, holding his own with older counterparts to shoot 73-76 while beating 23 players in the field, including LACC Director of Golf Tom Gardner, Norman Xiong, Dylan Block, and Steve Holmes, who recently qualified for the PGA Championship.
Soong drew the largest galleries of the day and while he struggled at times with the greens, was within just a few yards of the impressive ASU-bound Connor Williams (68-70) of Escondido. Maybe most impressive of all: Soong had never played a 36-hole qualifying of any kind and finished with a stellar attitude while battling a leg cramp. That’s more than we can say for several older and more accomplished players.
Other Notes: