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JUPITER, FLORIDA | The National Senior-Junior at Dye Preserve has been known for dramatic finishes, but Tim Jackson and Craig Smith made sure there was no intrigue down the stretch this time around.
The Tennessee twosome blitzed the field with an 11-under-par 61 in the final round last Wednesday to win by two strokes ahead of the teams of Roger Newsom/Tyler Gullicksen and Tommy Brennan/Patrick Christovich. The tournament, in which each team features one senior amateur and one mid-amateur, uses a four-ball format in the opening round, Chapman in the second and scramble in the third.
This year, the event boasted arguably its best field, with four of the top five senior amateurs in the world participating. Notable mid-amateurs Joseph Deraney and Matt Parziale also were among the contenders with their respective partners. Given the turnout, it made perfect sense that Jackson, a two-time U.S. Mid-Amateur champion and past Walker Cupper, would team with Smith for the title. It’s the second time they have won the event.
The pair hadn’t played much competitive golf before the tournament and won’t be playing much in the next few months – Jackson’s next start most likely will be the Coleman Invitational in late April – but they quickly shook off any rust after an opening 70 put them six strokes behind Deraney and Mark Mance. Nobody in the field matched their 8-under 64 the second day. That got them to within two strokes of Brennan and Christovich, with a crowded leaderboard seeming to signal an exciting final day.
Instead of a close battle, Jackson and Smith ran past everyone. They knew something special was brewing when they holed a 25-foot birdie putt on the short par-4 fifth following a layup off the tee and two mediocre wedge shots.
“That kind of got us going again,” Jackson said. “We played off each other really well. If one of us missed a fairway, the other hit a good drive. We never got in any trouble except for 17 when we made bogey.”
That late bogey at the diabolical par-3 didn’t matter because they had built a comfortable lead. The duo was 9-under par through 12 holes before a key par on the difficult par-3 13th set the stage for two more birdies at Nos. 14 and 15.
By that point, no other team had a realistic chance to catch them.
“It would have been nice to go bogey-free,” Smith said. “If you are driving it well out here, you have a pretty good chance because the greens were receptive.”
In the Legends Division, Pat Tallent and Michael Murr closed with a 63 to win by one stroke ahead of the teams of Larry White/Larry Clark and Tom Knapp/Dick Clemens.
RESULTS
Sean Fairholm