Gross gets in position to earn spot in match-play bracket in U.S. Junior Amateur with a 68 at Trinity Forest

 

   Wasn’t sure if Nick Gross, the PIAA Class AAA champion as a sophomore at Downingtown West in 2021, planned to tee it up in the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship.

   I knew he wouldn’t turn 19 until well into August, but with a year of college golf at Alabama already behind him, would Gross still consider playing against junior competition?

   I was checking in on some of Elite Amateur Series events and saw that Gross teed it up in the Sunnehanna Amateur at the Sunnehanna Country Club in Johnstown and competed in the North & South Amateur Championship at the Pinehurst Resort’s No. 2 Course in North Carolina, where he reached the quarterfinals in that storied event.

   But there Gross was when the results from the first day of qualifying for match play in the U.S. Junior Amateur started trickling in Monday from Dallas, Texas, where 100-degree days are days that end in Y.

   Back among his age group for the first time in a while, Gross carded a solid 3-under-par 68 at Trinity Forest Golf Club, where the tournament will play out when match play gets under way Wednesday morning, that left him in a group of nine players tied for seventh place.

   Gross will tee it up in Tuesday’s second round at Brook Hollow Golf Club, an A.W. Tillinghast classic that is the alternate site for qualifying.

   The top 64 finishers following two rounds of qualifying will advance to the match-play bracket and Gross, one of the finest players ever produced by District One, is in very good shape to earn one of those coveted match-play brackets.

   Gross, who was in the starting lineup in every tournament in which Alabama competed as a freshman during the wraparound 2024-2025 season, opened his round Monday with six straight pars before making a bogey at the seventh hole. He jump-started his round with back-to-back birdies at the eighth and ninth holes.

   A bogey at the 11^th hole dropped Gross back to even-par, but he got back into red figures with back-to-back birdies at 13 and 14. Gross gave a shot back with a bogey at the 15^th hole, but again went back-to-back with birdies at 16 and 17 to get in at 3-under.

   That left him two shots behind co-leaders Kailer Stone of Alameda, Calif. and Qiyou Wu of China, both of whom posted a 5-under 66 at Trinity Forest.

   Regardless of the outcome of this week’s U.S. Junior Amateur, Gross has already secured a spot in next month’s U.S. Amateur, which tees off Aug. 11 at The Olympic Club in San Francisco, Calif.

   Gross signed for a 4-under 68 in a U.S. Amateur qualifier July 14^th at BraeBurn Country Club in Houston, Texas that left him in a tie for seventh place.

   Gross made quite a splash in his first U.S. Amateur appearance, reaching the quarterfinals in 2022 at Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus, N.J. a week before his 16^th birthday.

    Next year the U.S. Amateur will be played at the iconic East Course at Merion Golf Club in the Ardmore section of Haverford Township. It would be something of a home game for Gross, who made the cut and played in the final round as a 14-year-old in the 2021 Pennsylvania Amateur at Merion.

   Stone, a Class of 2026 competitor who will join the program at West Coast Conference power Pepperdine next summer, started off the 10^th tee at Trinity Forest Monday and put together an efficient five-birdie, no-bogey round to get a share of the lead.

   Stone made birdies at the14th and 16^th holes on the incoming nine, then had a burst to begin the front nine with birdies at one, two and four.

   Wu, a Class of ’27 entry, got off to a great start with birdies at Trinity Forest’s first three holes before making a bogey at seven.

   Wu got it going on the incoming nine as he made birdies at the 12^th and 14^th holes before making an eagle at the par-5 16^th to get to 6-under for his round. A bogey at the finishing hole dropped Wu back into a tie with Stone at 5-under.

   Heading a quartet tied for third place at 4-under was Miles Russell, the 16-year-old phenom from Jacksonville Beach, Fla. who is No. 18 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR).

   The talented left-hander was a dominant six-shot winner in the Rolex Tournament of Champions, the marquee event on the American Junior Golf Association (AJGA) circuit at TPC San Antonio, last fall and captured the title in the prestigious Junior Invitational at Sage Valley in Graniteville, S.C. in March.

   Joining Russell at 4-under – all four players tallied 67s at Trinity Forest – were Stuart Boulware of Fairway, Kan., Adam Villanueva of Austin, Texas who will stay at home and join the program at Southeastern Conference power Texas later this summer, and Ben Bolton of England.

   Among the group joining Gross at 3-under was defending champion Trevor Gutschewski of Omaha, Neb. who will join the program at another SEC power, Florida, later this summer. Gutschewski’s father, Scott, plays on the PGA Tour and the Korn Ferry Tour.

   Another player in the group at 3-under was Tyler Mawhinney, a Class of ’26 kid from Fleming Island, Fla. who will join the program at another SEC power, Vanderbilt, next summer.

   The winners of the PIAA Class AAA and Class AA crowns last fall, Fox Chapel’s Carson Kittsley and Wyoming Seminary’s Nick Werner, respectively, struggled in the opening round of qualifying.

   Kittsley, heading into his junior season of high school golf, recorded a 6-over 76 at the par-70 Brook Hollow layout.

   Werner, who will join the program at Penn State later this summer, registered an 82 at Brook Hollow. Werner’s victory in the PIAA Class AA Championship last fall gave him back-to-back state crowns.