It was a busy week at Bandon Dunes leading up to the U.S. Amateur final between Strafaci and Osborne

    I’ve been meaning to get to the 120th U.S. Amateur Championship all week at Bandon Dunes, which, in a little of over 20 years, has become one of America’s top golf destinations. But there has been a lot going on close to home and some loops to be had and I guess I could argue I’ve just been so mesmerized by the golf visuals delivered by the Dunes, hard by the Pacific Ocean in hard-to-reach southwestern Oregon, that I haven’t gotten around to writing about it. But a rainy Sunday morning in southeastern Pennsylvania is providing a perfect opportunity to play catch-up with the battle for the Havemeyer Trophy down to just two players.

   It's been a strange week for Tyler Strafaci, the Georgia Tech fifth-year senior who will take on take on SMU junior Ollie Osborne for the U.S. Amateur crown Sunday at Bandon Dunes, one of the many spectacular courses that form the still growing Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Bandon, Ore. But hey, strange is what 2020 has been all about, so a little strange in this year doesn’t seem all that strange at all.

   Strafaci of Davie, Fla. reached the final with a 1-up victory over Aman Gupta, a junior at Oklahoma State from Concord, N.C., in prime time Saturday night here on the East Coast.

   Strafaci, the grandson of Frank Strafaci Sr., winner of the 1935 U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship, looked like he was going to cruise into the U.S. Amateur final when he held a 4-up advantage on the talented Gupta with just seven holes to play.

   But Gupta came roaring back, starting with a win at the 13^th hole. It only took a double bogey for Gupta to cut his deficit in half at the par-3 15^th hole, which was a puzzle none of the semifinalists could solve.

   A birdie at the 16^th hole from seven feet after a spectacular approach from a fairway bunker got Gupta within 1-down and a Strafaci bogey at the 17^th hole sent the match to the 18^th tee all tied up.

   Gupta’s luck ran out on the last, though. He found a fairway bunker on the right side of the hole and twice left it in the bunker. When his 20-foot bogey putt wouldn’t fall, Strafaci could breathe a sigh of relief.

   Osborne of Reno, Nev. had a comparably uneventful 4 and 2 victory over Matthew Sharpstene, who will play his final college season at Charlotte after three years at West Virginia, in the other semifinal.

   Osborne’s most anxious moments might have been the hours between his 77 at Bandon Dunes in the opening round of qualifying for match play Monday and his 7-under 64 at Bandon Trails, another Coore-Crenshaw effort that draws nothing but raves, in Tuesday’s second round of qualifying.

   Much like the U.S. Women’s Amateur a week earlier at Woodmont Country Club in Rockville, Md., the U.S. Amateur leaves you with a sense of regret for the college postseason we never got to see because of the coronavirus pandemic.

   Strafaci will be the second Georgia Tech golfer Osborne will face in match play at Bandon Dunes. He had to get past Noah Norton, a senior from Chico, Calif., for a hard-fought 2 and 1 victory in Thursday morning’s second round.

   How good would the Yellow Jackets have been last spring? In addition to Strafaci and Norton, the roster also included just the defending U.S. Amateur champion Andy Ogletree, who missed match play at Bandon Dunes with a 3-over 146 total, which left him a shot out of a bulky playoff among 18 players for the final three spots in the match-play bracket. Ogletree came to Bandon Dunes at No. 9 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings (WAGR).

   And SMU would have been no slouch either. In addition to Osborne, the Mustangs also had the winner of the 2019 American Athletic Championship, Mac Meissner, returning. All Meissner, No. 25 in the WAGR, did was fire an opening salvo of 8-under 64 at the Dunes in the first round of qualifying for match play.

   Meissner cooled off in the second round with a 74 at Bandon Trails, but reached the second round of match play before failing to the week’s most tragic figure – just golf tragedy not real tragedy – Argentina’s Segundo Oliva Pinto, in the second round of match play.

   Oh, and don’t forget the presence on the SMU roster of Noah Goodwin, winner of the 2017 U.S. Junior Amateur at Flint Hills National Golf Club in Andover, Kan. and No. 44 in the WAGR. Goodwin failed to make match play with a 6-over 149 total, one of many reminders that one of the toughest things to accomplish in golf is being among the top 64 in U.S. Amateur qualifying.

   It seems like 10 years ago now, but SMU won a playoff to be the last of eight teams that made it into match play in the 2019 NCAA Championship at The Blessings Golf Club in Fayetteville, Ark.

   Strafaci will be trying to become the fourth Georgia Tech player to hoist the Havemeyer Trophy, a list headed by one Bobby Jones, a five-time U.S. Amateur champion, most notably a 1930 victory at Merion Golf Club’s iconic East Course which completed the old Grand Slam (U.S. Open and Amateur, Open Championship and Amateur Championship) in a single year. Also on that list of Yellow Jackets who have won the U.S. Amateur are Matt Kuchar and Ogletree.

   And you might be surprised to learn that Osborne has a shot to become the fifth SMU player to win the U.S. Amateur and they’ve all been in the last 22 years, including Hank Kuehne in 1998, Colt Knost in 2007, Kelly Kraft in 2011 and, most recently, Bryson DeChambeau in 2017.

   There weren’t a ton of competitive opportunities in this crazy coronavirus summer of 2020, but the North & South Men’s Amateur Championship at the Pinehurst Resort’s iconic No. 2 Course provided one of them and there Strafaci joined his grandfather as a champion with a victory on the Fourth of July.

   That gives Strafaci a chance to join a pretty exclusive club of players who have won the North & South and the U.S. Amateur in the same year, George Dunlap (1933), that Jack Nicklaus fella (1959) and Hal Sutton (1980).

   Strafaci had to go the distance in Friday afternoon’s quarterfinals before finally edging Stewart Hagestad, who I got to watch rally to claim the 2016 U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship at Stonewall, 1-up.

   It was a typically strong week for Hagestad, at 29 still a formidable presence among amateurs of any age. He fired a 5-under 66 at Bandon Trails in the second round of qualifying to finish in a tie for 11^th place at 4-under 139.

   Hagestad cruised to a 4 and 3 win over Harrison Ott, a senior at Vanderbilt from Milwaukee, in the round of 16 before falling to Strafaci in the quarterfinals.

   Hagestad came to Bandon Dunes at No. 15 in the WAGR and his performance this week should bump him up a little. If he can be among the top seven amateurs in the WAGR not already eligible, Hagestad can get a spot in next month’s U.S. Open at Winged Foot Golf Club.

   Strafaci’s victory in Friday morning’s round of 16 was the most bizarre of the week and I’m not completely sure what happened.

   Strafaci arrived at the 18^th tee tied with Oliva Pinto, the Argentinian. Oliva Pinto’s approach to the par-5 18^th green ended up in a greenside bunker and somewhere along the way, Oliva Pinto’s caddy, a Bandon Dunes regular, touched the sand in the trap.

   It was ruled a violation of the rule forbidding testing the condition of the sand, meaning Oliva Pinto lost the hole and the match. Strange? Come on, it’s 2020, a year in which you just have to embrace the strange.

   Hagestad was one of three USGA champions to reach the quarterfinals at the spectacular Bandon Dunes, a David McLay Kidd design, and all three lost.

   Michael Thorbjornsen, who captured the 2018 U.S. Junior Amateur at Baltusrol Golf Club and is No. 43 in the WAGR, fell to Gupta, 1-up, and 2015 U.S. Junior Amateur champion Philip Barbaree, a senior at LSU, dropped a 4 and 2 decision to Sharpstene.

   Sharpstene opened match play with a pretty significant victory, taking out last year’s U.S. Amateur runnerup John Augenstein, 1-up. Augenstein, a senior at Vanderbilt, arrived at Bandon Dunes at No. 21 in the WAGR.

   Augenstein was one of the heroes of a rally by the United States to claim a Walker Cup victory over Great Britain & Ireland last year at Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake, England. And yes, Vandy would have been a national championship contender had the 2019-2020 college season been allowed to play itself out.

   The week began with Alabama senior Wilson Furr firing a spectacular 9-under 62 at Bandon Trails in the second round of qualifying to claim medalist honors with an 11-under 132 total. Vanderbilt’s Ott took Furr out in 19 holes in the second round of match play.

   Michigan State senior James Piot added a 7-under 65 at Bandon Dunes to his opening-round 69 at Bandon Trails to finish second in qualifying with a 9-under 134 total.

   Ben Shipp, who was a senior at North Carolina State in the pandemic-shortened 2019-2020 season, had a birdie-eagle finish at the Dunes for a second-round 67 that left him in third place at 8-under 135. Travis McInroe, a redshirt junior at Baylor, fired an opening-round 65 at the Dunes and added an even-par 71 at Bandon Trails to take fourth place at 7-under 136.

   Scott Harvey, the runnerup to Hagestad in that memorable 37-hole U.S. Mid-Am final at Stonewall in 2016, got it going in qualifying. The 2014 U.S. Mid-Amateur champion at Saucon Valley Country Club from Kernersville, N.C., Harvey birdied six of the first 10 holes in the second round at the Dunes. His 5-under 67 left him in the group tied for seventh place in qualifying at 5-under 138.

   Another alum of that 2016 U.S. Mid-Am at Stonewall, Derek Busby of Ruston, La., earned a spot in the match-play bracket, a second-round 70 at Bandon Trails giving him a 1-over 144 total.

   Harvey and Busby were both ousted in the opening round of match play, Harvey falling to Davis Chatfield, a senior at Notre Dame from Attleboro, Mass. who earned a 1-up victory, and Busby dropping a 2 and 1 decision to Frankie Capan III of North Oaks, Minn., who transferred from Alabama to Florida Gulf Coast since the college season came to its premature end.

   The most noteworthy player besides Ogletree to miss the match-play bracket was Texas junior Cole Hammer of Houston. Hammer, No. 16 in the WAGR, added an even-par 72 at the Dunes to his opening-round 74 at Bandon Trails for a 3-over 146 total, which, like Ogletree, left him a shot out of the playoff.

   Heading a short list of players with local ties at Bandon Dunes was Jack Wall of Brielle, N.J., the younger brother of Jeremy Wall, who won the second of back-to-back BMW Philadelphia Amateur crowns at Stonewall in 2019. Wall, a sophomore at South Carolina, improved from a 9-over 80 at Bandon Trails with a 1-over 73 at the Dunes for a 10-over 153 total.

   Sean Knapp, the 2017 U.S. Senior Amateur winner at The Minikahda Club in Minneapolis, struggled to an 82 in the opening round of qualifying at the Dunes before adding a 2-over 73 at Bandon Trails for a 155 total. Knapp was coming off a runnerup finish in the Pennsylvania Golf Association’s Senior Amateur Championship at Stonewall’s North Course, shortened from 36 holes to 18 holes by Tropical Storm Isaias.

   Palmer Jackson, the 2018 PIAA Class AAA champion at Franklin Regional, and Evan Brown, who was one of the Ches-Mont League’s top players at Kennett, both landed on 13-over 156.

   Jackson, who made a spectacular run to the quarterfinals of last year’s U.S. Amateur at Pinehurst before his freshman season at Notre Dame, also struggled in the opening round at the Dunes with an 81 before adding a 75 at Bandon Trails.

   Brown, a senior at Loyola of Maryland, opened with a 3-over 75 at the Dunes before adding an 81 at Bandon Trails.