Nettles leads Bina by one after opening round of Pennsylvania Open at Oakmont

    Tom Nettles, a two-time PIAA runnerup during an outstanding scholastic career at Peters Township, got a birdie at the ninth hole, his last hole of the day, to fire a 4-under-par 67 at one of America’s toughest tests, Oakmont Country Club outside of Pittsburgh, to claim a one-shot lead after Monday’s opening round of the Pennsylvania Golf Association’s 104^th Open Championship, presented by Dick’s Sporting Goods.

   The lure of the 6,838-yard, par-71 Henry Fownes classic at Oakmont, site of nine, count ’em, nine U.S. Opens, combined with a coronavirus pandemic that has limited a lot of competitive opportunities for pros and amateurs alike, brought together a tremendously talented field to suburban Pittsburgh this week.

   And Nettles, who played collegiately at Campbell and Ohio University, topped the field after the opening round of the 54-hole tournament. Carey Bina, whose scholastic career at Radnor High I chronicled for the Delaware County Daily Times, also finished his round at the ninth hole and also birdied it to land alone in second place, a shot behind Nettles at 3-under 68.

   Nettles has status on PGA Tour Latinoamerica in 2020, but all of the tour’s developmental circuits have been unable to get back on track since the global pandemic shut things down in March.

Starting on the back nine, Nettles really got it going early in his round. He knocked a wedge from 107 yards away to four feet at the 14^th and converted the birdie putt.

   He pulled his tee shot into the 212-yard, par-3 16^th hole, but drained a 50-footer for birdie. Nettles laid up with a 4-iron on the tricky 308-yard, par-4 17^th hole, hit a wedge to 10 feet and made the birdie putt to get it to 3-under for the round.

   After turning to the front nine, Nettles got it to 4-under with a birdie at the first hole. A bogey at the third hole, the only blemish on his scorecard, dropped him back to 3-under until he picked up a two-putt birdie at the par-5 ninth to take sole possession of the lead.

   “After going 3-under at the turn, I was happy,” Nettles told the PAGA website. “It’s really hard to get going here at Oakmont, so I was happy with that. You can’t be disappointed in pars out here. Obviously, you’d like to get a few more birdies here and there, but pars are good whenever you come by them.”

   Nettles was the PIAA runnerup in 2011, the last season before the state tournament field was split into Class AAA and AA, and again in 2012 in Class AAA.

    In a tie for 16^th as a junior at Radnor at the 2011 PIAA Championship was Carey Bina. It’s been quite the golf journey for Bina since then, but he told me after earning a spot in the match-play bracket in the 2019 BMW Philadelphia Amateur at Stonewall that he was planning to give pro golf a shot and he made his pro debut in last year’s Pennsylvania Open at Waynesborough Country Club.

   As I’ve mentioned in a couple of previous posts, nobody analyzed his round better or more completely than Bina, even as a high school kid. Not just what club he used, but the club he could have used and why he used the club he did. It bordered on too much information, but not for a true golf geek like myself.

   Bina got off to a good start with birdies at the 10^th and 12^th holes, but went off the rails a little with bogeys at 14, 17 and 18.

   Turning to the front nine at Oakmont, Bina went 4-under in five holes, making birdies at the first, second, fourth and fifth holes. A bogey at the seventh hole dropped him back to 2-under for the round, but, like Nettles, he made a closing birdie at the ninth, his seventh of the round, to finish at 3-under.

   “In the past, if I’ve ever tried to replicate or compare to a previous round, you usually end up focusing on something that won’t get you the results,” the 24-year-old Bina told the PAGA website. “I think tomorrow, I want to focus on just being present and enjoying the round. Not looking at things like bogeys as a disappointment because they’re going to happen and just move on. If I trust that, I’ll arrive at my desired result, then I can just trust my game and enjoy how I got there.”

   Like I said, not exactly the typical quote you get from a golfer who just shot 68 at Oakmont.

   Nettles and Bina will have a ton of talented players chasing them when Round 2 tees off Tuesday morning. The field will be cut to the low 40 and ties following Tuesday’s round.

   Matt Holuta of Indiana, who completed a solid college career at Rutgers in 2018, was a shot behind Bina in third place with a 2-under 69.

   Amateurs Will Davenport, who plays out of Whitemarsh Valley Country Club, and Mark Goetz, a redshirt junior at West Virginia from Greensburg, were the only other players under par as they each carded a 1-under 70 to share fourth place.

   Davenport was GAP’s 2019 Middle-Amateur champion and earned a spot in the match-play bracket at last year’s U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship at the Colorado Golf Club.

   Chris Crawford, the Holy Ghost Prep and Drexel product, headed a group of eight players tied for sixth place at even-par 71. As in amateur in 2016, Crawford made it through local and sectional qualifiers to earn a spot in the last U.S. Open staged at Oakmont, so he’s seen The Beast at its most fierce.

   Also at even-par was amateur Jeff Osberg, coming off a playoff loss in the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s Patterson Cup last week at The 1912 Club. The 34-year-old Osberg, who plays out of Pine Valley Golf Club, owns six GAP major championships. If there’s any way to prepare for Oakmont, it might be by playing Pine Valley.

   Cole Willcox, once a scholastic standout at Malvern Prep, was in the process of regaining his amateur status when he contended in the Pennsylvania Open at Waynesborough last summer. An amateur now, Willcox is in the mix again at Oakmont as he, too, matched par with a 71.

   Bucknell senior Chris Tanabe, who captured the Pennsylvania Amateur title last summer at Aronimink Golf Club, also joined the party at even-par. Tanabe was the PIAA Class AA champion in 2016 as a senior at Quaker Valley.

   Another amateur, Wyomissing’s Nathan Sutherland, who starred scholastically at Holy Name, matched par at Oakmont as did Venetia’s Jimmy Ellis, a top western Pennsylvania mid-amateur.

   Rounding out the group at even-par were two pros, Overbrook Golf Club’s talented assistant Trevor Bensel and Travis Howe of Bellefonte.

   Six more players were tied for 14^th place at 1-over 72, but none more recognizable than Bob Ford, the legendary head pro at Oakmont. Ford retired to South Florida and the head pro job at another iconic course, Seminole Golf Club, following the 2016 Open at Oakmont.

   Not sure what the rule on spectators is for this week’s Pennsylvania Open, but I suspect Ford got a warm reception when he completed his round.

   Ford was joined at 1-over by a quintet of talented amateurs, headed by Maryland sophomore Austin Barbin, who was GAP’s Junior Player of the Year in 2019. Barbin of the golfing Barbins of Elkton, Md. plays out of Loch Nairn Golf Club.

   Garrett Engle, an Oklahoma recruit who will spend his final year of high school in Pinehurst, N.C., was also at 1-over. Engle, who plays out of the Country Club of Harrisburg, played some high school golf at Central Dauphin, but always opted out of the PIAA postseason.

   Rounding out the group at 1-over were Tanabe’s Bucknell teammate Peter Bradbeer, winner of GAP’s Patterson Cup in 2017 at Wilmington Country Club’s South Course, Little Mill Country Club’s Troy Vannucci, who teamed with Vince Kwon to reach the semifinals of the 2019 U.S. Amateur Four-Ball Championship at Bandon Dunes, and Ambrose Abbracciamento, whose senior season at San Diego State was cut short by the pandemic.

   Bradbeer, who plays out of Merion Golf Club, also had his senior season ended prematurely by the pandemic.