Koivun sends Auburn to NCAA Championship's Final Match against Florida State at La Costa

 

 

   On a day when seeds meant very little, when form seemed to take a back seat, the best player in college golf during the wraparound 2023-2024 season, Auburn freshman Jackson Koivun, finally made it all make a little sense when he dropped a five-foot putt for birdie to send the Southeastern Conference champion Tigers to the NCAA Championship’s Final Match.

   Quarterfinal/semifinal day of the NCAA Championship at the Omni La Costa Resort & Spa’s North Course delivered its usual share of drama, particularly in a morning round when the four lower seeds swept past the four higher seeds.

   All of which left Auburn, which came into the NCAA Championship as the No. 1 team in the Scoreboard powered by clippd rankings, as the clear favorite going into its semifinal match with Big Ten upstart Ohio State.

   But the Buckeyes battled right to the finish. With darkness descending on the Southern California coast Tuesday evening, Koivun of Chapel Hill, N.C. and No. 4 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR) got it up and down from a greenside bunker at the par-5 18^th hole at the North Course, the 21^st hole of the match, to edge Ohio State’s Adam Wallin, a senior from Sweden, with a birdie, delivering the clinching point for Auburn in a 3-2 victory.

   Auburn will battle Atlantic Coast Conference runnerup Florida State for the national title Wednesday at La Costa after the Seminoles outlasted ACC rival Georgia Tech, 3-2, in the other semifinal.

   Auburn’s victory means redshirt junior Carson Bacha, the 2019 PIAA Class AAA champion as a senior at Central York and No. 62 in the WAGR, will get a chance to play for a national championship.

   Bacha fell to Ohio State’s Maxwell Moldovan, a senior from Uniontown, Ohio and No. 46 in the WAGR, 1-up in the semifinal match. Ohio State’s other full point came Tyler Sabo, a redshirt freshman from Ashland, Ohio who pulled out a 1-up victory over Josiah Gilbert, a freshman from Australia.

   But Brendan Valdes, a junior from Orlando, Fla. and No. 23 in the WAGR, earned a point for Auburn with a 1-up victory over Jackson Chandler, a fifth-year player from Dublin, Ohio, and J.M. Butler, a senior from Louisville, Ky. and No. 38 in the WAGR, slowed the roll of Ohio State graduate student Neal Shipley, a member of Pittsburgh Central Catholic’s 2018 PIAA Class AAA championship team, by claiming a 2 and 1 decision.

   With the teams deadlocked, all eyes turned to Koivun and Wallin. As he had in the morning in a battle with another college golf heavyweight in Vanderbilt’s Gordon Sargent, a junior from Birmingham, Ala. and No. 2 in the WAGR, Wallin erased a 2-down deficit with two holes to play against Koivun to send their match to extra holes.

   Not sure exactly when it was announced that Koivun had become the first Auburn player to win the Fred Haskins Award that goes to the top player in college golf, but it must have been late Monday or earlier in the day Tuesday.

   But there Koivun was trying to validate the award and get Auburn into the Final Match. He ripped his approach to the par-5 18^th hole into the bunker just below the flag and calmly got it up and down for the clinching birdie.

   Have to give Wallin credit. Earlier in the day, he had won the last two holes of regulation to send his match with Sargent in the quarterfinals to extra holes.

   When Sargent powered his five-foot par putt on the 19^th hole of the match through the break, Wallin had sent the seventh-seeded Buckeyes to the semifinals with a 3.5-1.5 victory over the Commodores.

   In the other semifinal, Florida State veteran Frederik Kjetterup, a senior from Denmark and No. 13 in the WAGR, clinched a spot in the Final Match for the Seminoles with a 3 and 1 victory over newly minted NCAA individual champion Hiroshi Tai, a sophomore at Georgia Tech from Singapore and No. 70 in the WAGR. That gave Florida State a 3-2 victory over its ACC rival.

   Luke Clanton, Florida State’s talented sophomore from Hialeah, Fla. and No. 8 in the WAGR, delivered a critical 2 and 1 decision over Christo Lamprecht, a senior from South Africa and the No. 1 player in the WAGR.

   Lamprecht was a big story all along at La Costa as he was sidelined with a bad back following the opening day of stroke play Friday and was still out of the lineup for the Yellow Jackets in their 3-1 victory over top-seeded Illinois, a perennial Big Ten power, in Tuesday morning’s quarterfinals.

   But Lamprecht gutted it out for the semifinals and had a 2-up lead on Clanton when Clanton ripped off wins on four straight holes to close out the top amateur player on the planet.

   Florida State’s third full point came from Luke Weaver, a freshman from England, who pulled out a victory on the 19^th hole over Kale Fontenot, a freshman from Lafayette, La.

   Georgia Tech veteran Bartley Forrester, a senior from Gainesville, Ga. and No. 80 in the WAGR, had put an early point on the board for the Yellow Jackets with a 3 and 2 victory over Cole Anderson, a redshirt junior from Camden, Maine and No. 79 in the WAGR.

   Georgia Tech’s other point came from Carson Kim, a freshman from Yorba Linda, Calif. who claimed a 4 and 2 verdict over Gary Albright, a senior from Ocala, Fla.

   Earlier in day, Weaver had delivered the clinching point for the Seminoles when he earned a 3 and 2 decision over North Carolina’s David Ford, a junior from Peachtree Corners and No. 10 in the WAGR, that gave Florida State a 3-1 victory.

   It was the most fascinating of the four quarterfinal matches Tuesday morning, the rematch of last month’s ACC final between Florida State and North Carolina.

   Florida State got a full point from Brett Roberts, a senior from Coral Springs, Fla. and No. 93 in the WAGR, as he earned a 2 and 1 victory over Tar Heels veteran Peter Fountain, a senior from Raleigh, N.C. and No. 63 in the WAGR.

   Clanton was also a 2 and 1 winner for the Seminoles over another tough customer in Austin Greaser, a graduate student from Vandalia, Ohio and No. 11 in the WAGR.

   North Carolina’s Dylan Menante, a fifth-year player playing close to his Carlsbad, Calif. home and No. 12 in the WAGR, closed out a brilliant college career that included a national championship with Pepperdine in 2021 with a 2 and 1 victory over Florida State’s Anderson.

   Kjetterup was trailing the other of North Carolina’s Ford triplets – the third Ford triplet is a girl, Abigail – Maxwell Ford, who is No. 50 in the WAGR, when Weaver’s win over David Ford clinched the win for the Seminoles.

   Maybe the most surprising result of the day was Ohio State’s victory over a powerful Vanderbilt team with a lineup that featured five players inside the top 21 of the WAGR in Tuesday morning’s quarterfinals.

   Regardless of seedings and rankings, when you get to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Championship, you have eight teams playing great golf and, hey, it’s match play.

   So, Ohio State’s Chandler knocks off Jackson Van Paris, a junior from Pinehurst, N.C. and No. 18 in the WAGR, 3 and 2. And Shipley, a little more than a month removed from earning low-amateur honors at the Masters Tournament, claims a 4 and 2 decision over Matthew Riedel, a graduate student from Houston, Texas and No. 21 in the WAGR.

   And finally, Sargent, a tremendous talent who went 4-0 for the United States in a victory over Great Britain & Ireland in a Walker Cup Match at the home of golf, the Old Course at St. Andrews, last summer, blows a 2-up lead with two holes to play against Wallin. It’s golf, happens all the time.

   Another Vandy veteran, Cole Sherwood, a senior from Austin, Texas and No. 20 in the WAGR, claimed a 3 and 2 victory over Moldovan and the Commodores’ other Houstonian, William Moll, a graduate student and No. 15 in the WAGR, was headed for extra holes with Sabo when Sargent couldn’t make his par putt on his 19^th hole just in front of Moll.

   It was the bitter end for a tremendous, yet ultimately unsatisfying era for Vanderbilt golf.

   Meanwhile Bacha, a state champion from Pennsylvania playing in the deep South, put a point on the board for Auburn with a 2 and 1 victory over Josh Duangmanee, a freshman from Fairfax, Va., early in its 3-1 victory over Virginia, the fourth ACC team among the eight quarterfinalists.

   Gilbert earned a 2 and 1 victory over Bryan Lee, a sophomore from Fairfax, Va. and No. 45 in the WAGR.

   And Koivun, who would clinch Auburn’s spot in the Final Match many hours later, pulled out a 1-up decision over Deven Patel, a junior from Johns Creek, Ga. and No. 96 in the WAGR, by sinking an eight-foot putt for the clinching point.

   Notice something? There was just a ton of guys in the top 100 in the WAGR and a bunch of guys who are probably headed there going at it all day. Not sure anything matches quarterfinal/semifinal day at the NCAA Championship for high-stakes drama in amateur golf.