U.S. AMATEUR
For the first time this week, the most exhilirating one of his life, Andrew Svoboda winced.
His face crinkled on the fifth green when he missed a three-footer for par and on the ninth tee after he watched his drive fly into the adjacent first fairway.
It turned sour again when his par putt lipped out of the 17th hole, and once more when his 8-iron approach at 18 nestled in the rough left of the green. He lost both holes with bogies.
And minutes after falling out of the 104th U.S. Amateur with yesterday’s 2-up loss to Jeff Overton in the quarterfinals, Svoboda winced a final time.
“It comes down to, I didn’t get it done on the greens,” he said. “The last two holes killed me. That’s about it.”
That was it, at least for the novelty here at Winged Foot Golf Club. Favorite son and club member Svoboda, flanked yesterday by a gallery of nearly 400 people, won’t be playing today’s semfinals.
Neither will 47-year-old sentimental favorite Danny Green, who fell 3-and-2 to Vanderbilt sophomore Luke List.
Instead, List will meet New Jersey’s Chris Nallen, a 6-and-5 quarterfinal winner over Dayton Rose. And Overton will play Ryan Moore, a two-time U.S. Amateur Public Links champ, who drubbed Jason Hartwick 3-and-2.
At stake is not only a spot in tomorrow’s 36-hole final, but also exemptions into next year’s Masters and U.S. Open.
“Another win, and I’m there,” said List. “That was the goal coming into the week. It would be a great accomplishment.”
The pairings provide four players possessing strong skills, but two owning far superior credentials.
Moore and Nallen finished 1-2 at this spring’s NCAA Championships. Nallen played in last summer’s Walker Cup, amateur’s golf top international competition, and Moore’s two USGA titles are two more than the other semifinalists combined.
“It might be slightly intimidating to play someone who’s won a lot of things,” Moore said. “It puts pressure on the other person that they have to play well to have a chance to win.”
List, meanwhile, qualified for the 2003 U.S. Open, and Overton won 2004 Big 10 Player of the Year Honors. Neither, though, had endured a U.S. Amateur match before Wednesday.
List has thrived so far, eliminating 2004 U.S. Junior champ Sihwan Kim, 1994 Amateur finalist Trip Kuehne, 2003 Amateur medallist John Holmes and Green in his four matches.
Overton, meanwhile, overcame a crowd he said cheered his poor shots against Svoboda, the four-time Winged Foot club champion. That should toughen him for Moore and his history of winning.
“I need to establish my game and not let him and who he is bother me,” Overton said. “That’s what match play is all about.”
