As fog lifts on 50th Walker Cup, U.S. team and Cypress Point deliver resounding victories

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – The fog had rolled in shortly after 5 p.m., just like they said it would, blanketing some of the most iconic golf holes in the world in a thick, white mist. And the Americans, just like everyone knew they would, rolled in the final singles session on Sunday at Cypress Point Club, turning a one-point advantage through three frames into another resounding Walker Cup victory.

As the last handful of matches were polished off, a four-point buck calmly strolled down the 17th fairway toward the 16th green, which was barely visible in the distance. Preston Stout, a skilled bow hunter unbeknownst to the deer, had just earned the winning point, nearly bulls-eyeing his approach at the penultimate hole in the process. And mere moments before that, the U.S. team’s old buck, 34-year-old Stewart Hagestad (or Hage-stag?), hooped a 20-foot birdie putt at the par-3 15th to put the retaining point on the board in what would ultimately be a 17-9 drubbing, the largest margin of victory since 2017 at Los Angeles Country Club, where Hagestad, in his debut, also earned the clinching point.

Hagestad is now 7-1 in singles for his Walker Cup career, tied with William Campbell for second all-time among Americans. He and his U.S. teammates won 13 of the 18 singles matches this weekend while posting an 8-1-1 score on Sunday afternoon, the most dominant performance since the final singles session moved to 10 matches in 2009.

“You just look up there and there’s just red all over the board; I couldn’t believe it,” said U.S. captain Nathan Smith, a player on three Walker Cup teams, two of them winners. “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a Walker Cup team bring it like they did this afternoon in singles.”

Perhaps it was most fitting that among those in attendance on Sunday was Stephen Ames.

It was an anti-climactic ending to what had been several days of golf nirvana on the legendary Dr. Alister MacKenzie gem, hidden from the golfing public for decades. Cypress Point hosted its first and only previous Walker Cup in 1981, and it hadn’t been part of the PGA Tour rota since 1990. But this week, Cypress’ big re-unveiling came complete with a high-def broadcast, mesmerizing drone shots, and before the fog arrived, plenty of sunshine to illuminate it all. The course was the main attraction, especially for those lucky enough to be on property and embark on MacKenzie’s “intoxicating natural journey through sea, sand and forest” while the best amateur players in the world showcased their God-given talents. If this wasn’t the best viewing experience this sport’s seen in a long time, it was close.

The are emotions that the Walker Cup, now 50 editions strong, can illicit that, say, the Ryder Cup can’t. There could never be a Ryder Cup at Cypress Point, the event’s scale too massive for the 6,600-yard layout; same goes for future Walker Cup venues such as Lahinch and Pine Valley. Even when the Walker Cup heads to Oakmont in seven years, the experience will be drastically different than it was for this summer’s U.S. Open, a behemoth of an operation. In a day and age where the PGA of America is peddling logoed napkins and drink stirrers for hundreds of dollars online, and scalpers are driving up already astronomical ticket prices, the USGA employed a modest buildout at Cypress – no grandstands, and just two large tents for hospitality and merchandise that fit inside the confines of the club’s driving range and along the first fairway. Sure, this Walker Cup wasn’t an easy ticket, but if obtained, one was treated to a purer, more intimate spectacle than the circus that we’ll surely see at Bethpage in a few weeks.

At the Walker Cup, the future meets the past on golf’s grandest stages. Where else can you find Bryson DeChambeau, Ian Poulter and Masters chairman Fred Ridley walking the fairways like everybody else? Before playing in the PGA Tour event in Napa later this week, Matt Kuchar took his oldest boy, Cameron, a TCU commit, down to Cypress for a few days, their trip culminating on this foggy Sunday evening where they had the best seats in the house on the Pacific’s version of Amen Corner. Kuchar is always smiling, but there’s truth to the adage that it’s impossible to have a bad day around these parts.

Even for the losing Great Britain and Ireland side, whose hopes at Sunday’s lunch break were crushed quicker than a back-to-front putt on Cypress’ 18th green, these weren’t good walks spoiled.

“The memories these kids are going to have are going to last a lifetime,” said Dean Robertson, the visiting side’s captain, who suffered a similar drubbing as a player at Interlachen in 1993. Not that the 54-year-old Robertson, GB&I’s first pro turned captain, is unique in that regard. Just two GB&I squads have won Walker Cups on U.S. soil, none since 2001 at Ocean Forest. The Americans own the all-time series, 40-9-1, and have now won 9 of 11 and five straight.

Hagestad has been a fixture for every victorious U.S. team in what is now the longest win streak since it won eight in a row in a 14-year span ending in 1987. In his previous four Walker Cups, Hagestad was a shoo-in selection, but a right-elbow injury last summer hampered his play, leaving the door open for Evan Beck to burst into the Walker Cup conversation by winning last year’s U.S. Mid-Amateur, plus mid-am majors, the Coleman and Thomas invitationals, at Seminole and LACC, respectively. Beck sped past Hagestad in the world rankings, though it was Hagestad who closed the gap late; Hagestad tied for eighth at the Northeast Amateur before making the Sweet 16 at the Western Amateur while Beck’s unimpressive final few months were capped by a stroke-play collapse at the U.S. Amateur. Before action ended for the week at the Olympic Club, Smith was dialing Hagestad to inform him of the USGA committee’s decision to select him.

When Hagestad’s clinching putt dropped on Sunday evening, two years’ worth of emotions poured out.

“Having tennis elbow was a total thorn in the side,” Hagestad said later, as he walked back to the clubhouse in the pitch black, soaked from a misty closing ceremony in the first fairway, “and to get that solved and to feel like I was chasing the whole year, we gave up a lot, personally, professionally, and there are a lot of people – they know who they are – who deserve a lot of thanks. … I’m grateful to be picked, but then you kind of know that some people went to war for you, so I’m glad that I had the opportunity to make them know that that decision was a good one.”

With the Walker Cup switching to even years, Hagestad is probably a solid bet to earn his sixth nod next September at Lahinch. That would draw him within three of the late Jay Sigel, the American record holder for appearance who died in April from pancreatic cancer at age 81. “There will only ever be one Jay Sigel.,” Hagestad stated. “I’m not trying to be Jay Sigel. His record is truly unparalleled. … But to even be referenced in the same conversation is pretty humbling.” While he knew Sigel, Hagestad’s poster on the wall was Smith, a 47-year-old insurance salesman from Brookville, Pennsylvania, who won a record four U.S. Mid-Amateurs (Hagestad can tie Smith in a few days in Scottsdale, Arizona) and the inaugural U.S. Amateur Four-Ball with partner Todd White.

“He’s an icon of the modern-day world of amateur golf,” Hagestad said of Smith, who will also captain in Ireland.

The admiration, of course, is mutual.

“Stew and I, we’ve had a great relationship for years,” Smith said. “With some of the things that he’s done with some Mid-Ams, playing in majors, I think that that’s brought us together a little bit. He’s asked me questions. I think we’ve bonded kind of through that. Then I totally love his game, respect his game, and really just couldn’t imagine being a captain on a Walker Cup team and him not being on my team.”

Logan Whitton/USGA Museum

Hagestad will undoubtedly follow in Smith’s footsteps as captain one day. As for his nine teammates, they’ll eventually all turn pro, like every one of Hagestad’s compatriots before them – nine guys from that 2017 U.S. squad went on to earn their PGA Tour cards, including world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler and fellow major champion Collin Morikawa; Hagestad was the only exception.

Jackson Koivun, in a sense, is already on Tour, having locked up his card via PGA Tour University’s Accelerated program, which rewards amateurs who’ve achieve elite benchmarks. Koivun, a junior at Auburn, proved his professional mettle with three top-11 finishes in Tour events this summer. Smith leaned on the world’s top-ranked amateur for all four sessions, and Koivun delivered with a 3-1 performance, tying Western Amateur champion and Oklahoma junior Jase Summy for the most points accrued this week.

When Koivun closed out Tyler Weaver, GB&I’s best player at No. 10 in the world, Smith shook Koivun’s hand and said, “Thank you for playing.” He then tossed him the keys to his golf cart.

“When your best player is your hardest working player, it sets the tone for the team,” Smith said. “… I said, ‘Yeah, go drive the cart, you’ve been driving it all week. I’m just going to ride along in the passenger side.’ That sums it up.”

The king of levity, Smith added that as his guys painted Cypress red, he sought shade under a cypress tree.

The only American who didn’t earn at least a half-point in Sunday singles was standing NCAA individual champion Michael La Sasso, who couldn’t replicate an opening foursomes victory alongside Summy. La Sasso lost both his matches on Sunday, including an alternate-shot bout against Scots Niall Shiels Donegan and Cammy Adam, during which La Sasso was pulled aside by an R&A referee, who scolded the Ole Miss Rebel for laying his putter down between he and the cup after not being given a short putt on the third hole. While Robertson said afterward, “No harm done,” the gamesmanship did fire up the GB&I side, which had flipped a huge point on Sunday morning when Luke Poulter and Charlie Forster rallied from 4 down through 10 holes to beat Stout and Ethan Fang.

The only problem was the Americans enjoyed a reversal of their own, with Koivun and Tommy Morrison winning each of the last two holes to exact revenge on Weaver and Connor Graham, who went 2-1-1 over four sessions to lead the visitors. Morrison followed by taking down Donegan in singles, while Ben James, Jacob Modleski and Fang added closing full points, the latter by the most lopsided score of Sunday afternoon, a 6-and-5 beatdown of mid-amateur Stuart Grehan.

Fang and Koivun will now trek north for this week’s Procore Championship, which will be Fang’s PGA Tour debut.

Mason Howell, meanwhile, will head back to high school.

The 18-year-old young buck from Thomasville, Georgia, had not yet dreamed of playing a Walker Cup when he wrapped up his junior year last May. But then came the 63-63 in U.S. Open final qualifying, and a spot in the U.S. Open at Oakmont, followed by medalist honors at the U.S. Junior, and finally his improbable victory at the U.S. Amateur, where he didn’t even know that the winner earned an automatic Walker Cup berth until the quarterfinal round. And yet, maybe Howell’s scorching play shouldn’t be all that surprising, as he started the festivities at Cypress with an albatross on the par-5 second during Friday’s practice round before holing length birdie putts on Nos. 15 and 16, and sealing his Sunday foursomes win alongside Modleski with a hole-out eagle from 147 yards at No. 17.

“I couldn’t even tell you what’s been going on these last two months,” Howell exclaimed.

Smith had heavy praise for Howell, a University of Georgia commit who works with Harris English’s childhood instructor, Bill Connally.

“It was like I had found Superman,” Smith said. “I couldn’t believe how well he was playing. Just this week through our practice sessions, you get to see everybody’s game, and I really couldn’t believe it up close. Just an incredible young man, mature beyond his years, and I think we’re going to be treated to some incredible golf by him for the next decades.”

Like Hagestad, Howell’s name is written in pencil for a second straight Walker Cup appearance, which would make Howell the first college-bound player to ever play in two Walker Cups before hitting a collegiate shot. Miles Russell, the 16-year-old who was first alternate this year should join Howell, though Koivun, James, Morrison and La Sasso will be among those likely turning pro before then.

GB&I could retain more key players than the Americans, most notably Weaver, Graham, Poulter and Donegan. Robertson, though, hasn’t received word of an encore, as rumors are already swirling that the R&A could tab former Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley to lead in his native country. McGinley went 1-2 in his sole Walker Cup, in 1991 at Portmarnock.

Regardless of who GB&I’s next captain is, the 51st Walker Cup will begin with the U.S. winner of nine of the past 11 contests. Every two years it seems more and more people clamor for changes – fewer points, more points and added formats, an additional day, even expanding the GB&I pool to include continental Europe. This event has certainly evolved since its inception in 1922. That year, there were four, 36-hole foursomes matches and eight, 36-hole singles matches, played over two days, with eight-man teams representing the U.S. and only Great Britain. But further tweaks, aside from maybe stretch the current format over three days, could risk this great competition losing some of its identity.

Robertson’s mantra all week was, “If they can believe, they can achieve.”

GB&I wasn’t lacking belief, taking 21 of 26 matches to at least the 16th hole; the Americans, with each of the top six amateurs in the world, were just stronger and significantly deeper (Howell was its worst-ranked player, at No. 143 in WAGR, over 300 spots better than Ireland’s Gavin Tiernan). Not even a Friday night video message from Rory McIlroy – “Please beat them because I know we’re going to beat them at Bethpage” – could inspire an upset in enemy territory.

And yet, GB&I will demand no help. After this week, its players will pick themselves up, emerge from the fog and try again in a year’s time. Just like they’ve always done.