OPEN AND SHUT
40-foot putt punches ticket to U.S. Open for 22-year-old
Christopher Crawford played out a dream virtually every young golfer has dreamt. The only difference: Crawford’s dream became reality, and the ending was positively spectacular.
Crawford, a 22-year-old amateur from Bensalem, Pa., playing in the secondto-last afternoon pairing at Monday’s U.S. Open Sectional Qualifier at Canoe Brook Country Club in Summit, N.J., drained a 40-foot birdie bomb on the 18th hole of the North Course to bust his way into the U.S. Open field.
He was the last of six players in the 98-player field to earn a spot into Oakmont Country Club outside Pittsburgh with the best players in the world next week.
Jim Herman, the former assistant pro for Donald Trump, tied with Rob Oppenheim as a medalist at 7-under for the grueling 36-hole test. Herman’s fellow PGA Tour pro and friend Justin Hicks, along with Michael Miller, a Brewster, N.Y. native and Andy Pope were the other qualifiers along with Crawford to get in at 6under.
As he stood over that putt with a crowd gathered around the green, Crawford knew exactly what was hanging in the balance.
“I knew,’’ he said. “They told me. I had to ask.’’
There probably is not a golfer on the planet who has not — alone in the quiet of an early-evening session on a practice green — dreamt about having a putt to get into (or winning) a big tournament like the U.S. Open.
“Everyone who grows up playing golf dreams of those moments,’’ Crawford said. “And I thought of it right there: ‘This putt’s to get into the Open.’ This is what you want.’’
And it’s exactly what Crawford got.
Making his journey even more remarkable was the crazy way Crawford played No. 18 on the North Course, his 36th hole of the day. He hooked his tee shot into the rough on the adjacent 13th fairway and decided to play his way down the 13th hole in an effort to get onto the par-5 green in three shots. His third shot was a 6-iron over the trees onto the green — 40 feet from glory.
“Did you see how I played the hole?’’ Crawford said incredulously. And, about the putt? “I was like, ‘I’ve just got to get it there; you can’t leave it short here,’ ’’ he said. “And I had been leaving putts short all day. A putt like that … that’s a lot of luck, honestly.’’
Crawford, for added synergy, was wearing an Oakmont cap for the occasion, a hat he’d gotten while playing in the Pennsylvania State Amateur in 2014 at Oakmont, where he said, “I got a top 10, for what that’s worth.’’
A top-10 next week at Oakmont will change his life forever.
Crawford’s storybook finish overshadowed Miller, whose father, Bob, has been the head pro at Knollwood Country Club in Elmsford for 31 years.
Miller, 24, is the poster child of the young grinder trying to make it as a pro. This year alone, he’s tried to Monday qualify for six Web.com events and three PGA Tour events, making it into only one Web.com tournament, at which he missed the cut.