At U.S. Open qualifying, every stroke matters, including strokes of fate

PURCHASE, N.Y. — James Nicholas, the former Yale biology major who chose Q School over med school, has played all over the world in his 29 years, including Kenya and Qatar, across Europe and South America. But on Monday, he played in his childhood backyard, in a manner of speaking. He grew up in nearby Scarsdale, had breakfast in his childhood home on Monday and then made the short drive to the Golf Club of Purchase for the first part of his 36-hole one-day qualifier for the U.S. Open — the national Open, at Shinnecock Hills.

Nicholas — with his wife, America, caddying for him — shot a morning 68. Seventy-nine players for four spots. So far, so good. Husband and wife made the five-minute drive to Century Country Club, a Golden Age jewel. Purchase is a Golden Bear (Jack Nicklaus) showpiece moderne.

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Nicholas made four straight pars to start at Century. On to the 5th, a 460-yard par-4 where you can’t miss right. Nicholas has played in 13 Korn Ferry events this year and made six cuts, though not his last two. That was then, this is now. Though now in golf is always, to some degree, shaped by all that has preceded it.

He stepped in, driver in hand. America, a psychology major and a dancer as an undergraduate at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., held her husband’s carry bag in the locked and upright position. You might know the couple, together since high school. They share their lives on golf’s back roads on social media in a way few golf couples, if any, do. Shrimp and an orzo salad for a recent dinner and the rest. You want healthy, disciplined living, find James and America on all your favorite platforms.

At the 5th, Nicholas drove it wildly right. His Titleist ball went into some deep shrubbery not meant for man or ball. His provisional was worse, 20 yards right of his first and totally gone. If you and I were playing were playing for fun, we’re done then and there, right? Your hole — just put me down for 7. But you can’t, of course, do that in a U.S. Open qualifier.

Young James Nicholas, who played in his first U.S. Open last year at Oakmont (played the fourth round with Brian Harman — how fun is that?), was looking kinda stressed. His mother and brother and caddie, ditto. The dozen or more spectators with a rooting interest, ibid. His former college coach, Colin Sheehan, was following the action via his laptop while on a family vacation in Athens — how Yaley is all that? Finally, Nicholas’s second provisional — his third drive from the 5th tee — was right down Broadway. A par on his third ball would mean an 8 on the hole. Hard to recover from that.

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One of the spectators went running down the 5th fairway. You get only three minutes to search for a wayward ball but the clock doesn’t start until the player gets to the scene of the crime. A marshal was out there, in the land of the lost, with only a vague notion of where the first ball went. The running spectator — okay, jogging, the man is 58 and is not on an orzo salad diet — was no ordinary spectator. It was Phil Mintz, a comically profane former Duke tennis player, retired partner at Apollo Global Management and, notable in this context, a four-time club champ at Century who has played golf with Nicholas since Nicholas was at Scarsdale High. A local high school golf coach, Mark Canno, was right behind Mintz. Both are Nich-o-philes. “Not only one of the best players I’ve ever seen around here, but the nicest kid,” Canno will tell you. Mintz will say the same. He had taken Nicholas out for a practice round just a few days earlier.

Nicholas grew up playing at Westchester Country Club and Winged Foot. So, yes, high cotton, New York style. Mintz describes Century as “the Jewish Winged Foot.” Totally different and one of the same, if you know what I mean, and you may not. Century takes in a handful of new members a year, if that.

You could write a book about upper crust golf in Westchester County. In all of golf, across the United States, there’s nothing like it, the vastness of the wealth, the beauty of the courses, the tribal affiliations, the timelessness of it all. Before Monday, I had not been to Century in 40 years, since caddying in the 36-hole qualifier on the eve of the 1986 U.S. Open, also at Shinnecock Hills. The whole place seemed unchanged, except there’s a new single-stall men’s room off the clubhouse, convenient if you’re making the turn, with a black-and-white photo of Ben Hogan in follow-through on one wall and a color one of local boy Cameron Young, doing the same, on another.