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LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA | Mackenzie Hughes was where he needed to be.
One stroke behind with nine holes to play in the U.S. Open, a new frontier for the 30-year-old Canadian who had made just three major championship cuts in nine starts.
Of all the challenges the South Course at Torrey Pines presented, a leafy tree left of the par-3 11th hole seemed among the least of them – until Hughes’ misguided tee shot lodged there.
Hughes knew it was a poor shot immediately, dropping his 5-iron and pointing left. But having his ball catch a cart path and settle into a tangle of branches more than 10 feet off the ground was one of the most unlikely developments in an afternoon full of them.
It led to a double bogey that effectively ended Hughes’ bid to win, a sudden twist of fate that stained an impressive week of work.
“I tried to hit a cut a 5-iron and double-crossed it,” said Hughes, who started the final round with a share of the lead but finished tied for 15th after a final-round 77. “I wasn’t super committed to what I was doing there. If I could have one back, that’s the one. I was right in the tournament there. Put a shot in the middle of the green there and who knows.
“Stuff like that means it probably wasn’t meant to be for me.”
When the week began, Hughes was about as far off the radar as anyone. He had missed five cuts in a row, hardly the trend line for a U.S. Open contender.
However, a tip related to his ball position at address began to pay dividends before he got to Torrey Pines. Suddenly, Hughes knew he could count on hitting cuts consistently and it changed his mindset.
“Then golf sometimes just goes your way a little bit and you make a few putts and maybe pitch one in and you feel like momentum takes you forward rather than kind of going the other way,” he said.
In nine previous major championships, Hughes had missed the cut six times and never finished inside the top 40. That changed at Torrey Pines.
“I’ll leave here with a lot of confidence knowing that for 63 holes, I was in there with the best players in the world,” Hughes said. “I’ve just got to get a little better, plain and simple.”
Ron Green Jr.