The 2016 Missouri Junior Match Play Championship kicked off Monday, June 13th at Mules National Golf Club in Warrensburg, MO. With sunny skies and extreme temperatures nearly all week, the hot and humid playing conditions made the par 70 course a bit challenging for the junior golfers. The first day of the tournament consisted of an 18-hole qualifying round for both the men’s and women’s division. The next three days was strictly match play in a win or go home 32-person bracket.
The field consisted of 63 men and 14 women golfers. Our low score medalist after day one in the men’s division was Tony Brandt, who brought in an impressive -2 under par, 68. After all the scores from day one were in, 78 was the magic cut number to advance to the next round. In order to reach our number of 32 golfers for match play, there was a playoff hole between six golfers competing for four final spots. Brian Whitson, Logan D. Smith, Taylor Haltom, and Matthew Hoemann captured the last four spots after winning the first playoff hole. All 14 women advanced to the first round of match play. The low score medalist of the day went to Samantha Cornelius who shot a score of 79.
Day two of the junior match play began Tuesday morning (round of 32 and 16) consisting of 16 men’s matchups and 6 women’s matchups. Samantha Cornelius and Olivia Sowers drew first round byes after shooting the two lowest qualifying scores for the women. The afternoon matches (round of 16 for men and elite 8 for women) were close the whole time in which we had three different matches go into extra holes. At the completion of Tuesday’s afternoon matches, the Elite 8 for men and Semifinals for women were set for first thing Wednesday morning. The women’s Championship match and the men’s Semifinals would conclude Wednesday afternoon. The men’s Championship match was set for Thursday morning.
After three days of tough competition, the time had come to determine a women’s champion. The opponents of this match were (7) Olivia Sobaski and (1) Samantha Cornelius. From the first hole through the rest Olivia had a huge edge off the tee with her monstrous drives. Olivia then followed with pin point precision accuracy with her irons. Unfortunately for Samantha, who found trouble in multiple sand bunkers, her efforts weren’t enough. After nine holes Olivia was UP 6. She continued dominating and finished the match 7 and 6 to claim the championship title.
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On the men’s bracket, opponents were (6) Tanner Owen vs (29) Brian Whitson. The match started with a birdie from Tanner to go 1 UP. After the 4th hole it was all square. Brian then sunk a huge putt on the par 3 #6 to win the hole and take his first lead of the match. The match then goes back to all square until Tanner goes on a winning streak through the back nine reaching 3 UP. Brian fought back hard and brought the match to all square when he nearly holed out from 100 yards on the 16th. It wasn’t until the 22nd hole that we had a champion. On the #4 par 3, Tanner’s shot on the green off the tee secured him with par while Brian’s second chip fell short, nearly going into the hole. It was a great match throughout and we thank all our players for attending.
Congratulations to all our golfers competing in the championship and congratulations to our 2016 Missouri Junior Match Play champions, Olivia Sobaski of Sedalia and Tanner Owen of Parkville.
A huge thank you goes out to all the players, directors, Mules National Golf Club and all other contributors for allowing the Missouri Golf Association to put on such a successful, fun-filled tournament.