CHERRY HILLS VILLAGE, Colo. – Blades Brown’s mother, Rhonda, was the first player in WNBA history to record a 3-point shot.
On Tuesday at Colorado Golf Club, the 16-year-old Brown made five 3’s of his own, firing a course-record, 8-under 64 to earn co-medalist honors at 123street US Amateur.
“I was told that the US Am is like a level up from the US Open,” Brown said. “Being able to shoot 8 under here is awesome. It really gives me confidence in my game and my practice.
One of the youngest players in the field, the incoming high school sophomore from Nashville, Tennessee, got off to a slow start in this championship, carding six bogeys and shooting a 1-over 72 at Cherry Hills in the opening round. on Monday. He finished 1 over after five holes and no par on Tuesday before warming up, playing his next seven holes at 5 under. That run included a hole-out eagle with a 58-degree wedge on the 311-yard, par-4 eighth hole.
“We plan to go for the green, but it has to be perfect conditions,” Brown said. “There was a little wind in there and I was like, ‘Should I do it on a par 4?’ We hit a 4-iron, it was like my money club, and I had exactly 100 yards. I thinned it, but I played it off the slope and apparently it was a jump. Maybe that’s what started my back nine.
Brown birdied Nos. 11-12 and then ended his day with an eagle-birdie-birdie finish, the final birdie from 15 feet to get Brown into the clubhouse at 7 under, which would later be enough to share medalist honors in Illinois’ Jackson Buchanan and Cal’s Sampson Zheng after Tennessee’s Caleb Surratt, Brown’s friend, double-bogeyed Cherry Hills’ 18th hole to drop in 6 under.
“It can happen to anybody,” Surratt said. “No matter how well you play, you have to step up and hit two good shots.”
Brown hit more than just two great shots. Of course, great shooting is in his blood. Rhonda Blades Brown starred at point guard for Vanderbilt in the 1990s before spending time in the WNBA, where in 1998 she was the No. 1 pick in the 1998 expansion draft. Blades can also hoop, but golf is now his main sport as he has climbed to No. 6 in the AJGA rankings.
The Class of 2026 recruit has yet to commit to a school, so there will likely be a crowd of college coaches waiting for him on the first tee Wednesday at 9 a.m. when Brown, the top seed and the youngest US Amateur medalist/co-medalist ever (breaking 18-year-old Bobby Jones record set in 1920), against Benton Weinberg in Potomac, Maryland.
That match kicks off a day full of sparkling contests, headlined by Vanderbilt’s Gordon Sargent and Alabama’s Nick Dunlap, two Walker Cuppers considered two of the best prospects in amateur golf, squaring off in a a fight that could easily become the final. Other notable matchups include Jonas Baumgartner of Oklahoma State vs. Austin Greaser of North Carolina, Zheng vs. Preston Summerhays of Arizona State, Surrat vs. Dylan Menante of North Carolina and JM Butler of Auburn vs. Andrew Goodman of Oklahoma.
Wednesday will also be void of a playoff, as exactly 64 players finished at even par or better, the first time that has happened since 2000. The cut line is 1 over, but it has moved even after a live-scoring error was corrected, changing a closing double bogey by Menante into a par. That update sent a group of players home that included Stewart Hagestad, a three-time Walker Cupper who twice advanced to the US Amateur quarterfinals. Hagestad shot a 77 on Day 1 while carding a ’10’ on one hole, but he rallied to shoot a 4-under 67 on Tuesday at Cherry Hills, getting up and down for par from 200-plus yardage on the par-4 finishing hole to get. in 1 above.
That wasn’t the only wild part of the day. Summerhays tripled to No. 18 after hitting the flagstick with a greenside bunker shot to finally advance the number. UCLA’s Omar Morales, who qualified for the US Open earlier this summer, thought he finished at even par, but was assessed a one-shot penalty for slow play; he then waited hours only to find out that the 1 above was not good enough to play.
But 64 players will see another day at Cherry Hills:
Stars like Sargent and Dunlap.
Cool stories like Tennessee’s Bryce Lewis, with Steven Fox, the 2012 US Amateur champ at Cherry Hills, in his bag.
And potential Cinderellas like Blades Brown, the 16-year-old with a cool golf name just getting hot.