Late comeback, brilliant playoff birdie lift ORU’s Johnson to OGA State Amateur Championship
By Ken MacLeod
Christian Johnson spent his 2023-24 redshirt season at Oral Roberts wisely, gaining 15 pounds of muscle in the weight room and 25 yards off the tee while working hard on his game.
The 2023 Class 3A state champion at Christian Heritage Academy in Oklahoma City persevered Friday just as he did all last year, coming back from two holes behind with three to play to shock defending champion Will McDonald of Oklahoma City and win the Oklahoma Golf Association State Amateur Championship with a 22-foot birdie putt on the first playoff hole at The Patriot in Owasso Friday.
With the win comes an automatic berth in the 2024 U.S. Amateur Championship scheduled Aug. 12-18 at Hazeltine Golf Club in Chaska, Minn. McDonald is also in the event, having qualified in Dallas on Monday.
Johnson seemed equally thrilled with the win and the berth in the Amateur.
“I could not dream of anything better,” Johnson said. “It’s what I’ve worked my whole life for. It means everything to get represent my state, my team”
Johnson was showered by ORU assistant coaches and friends with water after making the winning birdie putt. The way the two played the downhill par-5 in the playoff was oddly similar to the way they played it at 8 a.m., but with a starkly different result.
As he had in the morning, Johnson hit his second shot into a bunker just in front the the pin and blasted long. As he did in the morning, McDonald hit his second shot just right of the green and faced a long chip. Instead of getting up and down for birdie as he did in regulation, McDonald left his chip short and missed about a 24-foot putt for birdie. Johnson, who missed his birdie putt in the morning, then drilled his downhill 22-footer for the win.
“We knew what the putt did and it was pretty similar to the putt I had on the first hole,” he said. “It broke about two cups to the right. I just gave it a little extra and it went right in the middle.”
Johnson becomes the fourth ORU golfer to win the OGA State Amateur, joining Dave Barr in 1973, Jim Kane in 1979 and 1980 and Mike Hughett in 2001. Hughett, the 2023 inductee into the Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame, watched all 18 holes of the championship match.
Combined with the earlier victory by Presten Richards0n in the OGA Stroke Play Championship at WinStar Resort in Thackerville, it gave ORU a sweep of the two premier OGA amateur events.
“I’m proud of him,” said ORU coach Lance Watson. “He’s a young man who does everything you ask of him. He’s worked so hard in the last year to make himself a better player.”
McDonald, a graduate student at Cincinnati, also credited Johnson for his tournament and his comeback. Although he made four birdies in the final match, he wasn’t as crisp with his iron play as he had been all week and consecutive bogeys on holes 5 and 6 put him behind for one of the rare times in his five matches. He rebounded to win hole nine with a par and 10 with a birdie to regain a one-hole advantage and it stayed that way until a conceded birdie on the par-5 15th put him two up.
Most figured that would be it, but Johnson hit a 3-wood from 262 yards to leave himself a 10-foot eagle putt on the par-5 16th. McDonald’s 3-iron from 245 came up 10 yards short of the green and the best he could make was par.
With the pin on the par-3 17th tucked back and left, both players left themselves long birdie putts. Johnson left his 10 feet short, but coolly made it to extend the match.
“I told my caddie (high school teammate Kelton Kufahl) that this is the biggest putt of my life, why not make it?” Johnson said. “We did, and go to 18.”
And then to the playoff hole, where the next biggest putt of his life vaulted Johnson into the record books and into the U.S. Amateur, where he’ll be joined by McDonald, Ryder Cowan, Drew Goodman, Jaxon Dowell and other players with strong Oklahoma ties.
Champion Christian Johnson
