Ten years ago my son Nick had a pretty impressive spring and summer as a high school and junior golfer. The then 16-year-old won the Coastal Mountain Conference individual title and got through two levels of the North Coast Section playoffs. He won the Lake County Junior and shot a 6-under-par 66 to win the Buckingham Junior. He went to one-day, 36-hole qualifying for the U.S. Publinx in Fernley, Nevada. Nick and I also played in the NorCal Parent Junior Championship at Poppy Ridge in Livermore that summer.
The Parent Junior is a pure alternate shot tournament. We had competed in it since Nick was a 9-year-old. Obviously we were getting better as a team as he was getting older and more talented as a golfer. We both played well on day one and when we chipped in for an eagle-three on the 18th hole, we stood at a pretty impressive 3-under-par 69. The following day we would be in the penultimate pairing. We would be playing with the Murphys and the Wilsons. The Murphys owned Stevinson Ranch Golf Course and the son was headed to Colorado to play college golf. Zach Wilson was a freshman at Justin-Siena High School. His dad owned a automobile dealership in Fairfield. The Wilsons were ahead of us by three strokes.
As we were heading back to our hotel after the first round, Nick was feeling positive about our first-round performance. “You know, we could be the champs of this tournament by this time tomorrow.” I just nodded and added that “you never know with golf.” But I did know. Our twosome as well as the Murphys had no chance to win, regardless of how well we played. There is no such thing as playing defense in golf and no one was going to stop the Wilsons.
I first played golf with Jeff Wilson in the mid-1980s. He was a sophomore at the University of the Pacific. We were paired together in the State Fair Amateur at Sacramento’s Haggin Oaks Golf Complex. I was most impressed with his talent level that day. He was truly gifted. After becoming an All-American at UOP, Wilson tried the world of professional golf. He worked his way onto the PGA Tour, had a top-five finish in the Southern Open, but found himself just outside the top 125. We next crossed paths a few years later when we were paired in the same grouping at the Northern California Open at Chardonnay in Napa. Jeff was still a pro, but you could see that he enjoyed the advantages of living at home and being with family. In time, Jeff got reinstated as an amateur golfer and started competing in regional and national amateur golf tournaments. He still had the competitive edge, but he also had a young family as well as a business to look after. “It was fun to compete against the best on a limited basis.”
In 2000, Wilson qualified into the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach. Tiger Woods ran away with the National Open title that year. Next to Woods during the concluding awards ceremony was Jeff Wilson, who not only made the 36-hole cut but also received the USGA’s silver medal for being the low amateur. The low amateur acclaim was a high-water mark for Wilson who would end up playing in more than 30 USGA championships on six different levels. Six levels are almost impossible to imagine, but Wilson has competed in the U.S. Junior, Amateur, Mid-Amateur, Open, Senior Open, and Senior Amateur.
Earlier this summer Jeff was once again on the podium at a USGA event. Standing next to Senior Open champion David Toms at the Broadmoor in Colorado, Wilson was the low amateur at the U.S. Senior Open, finishing tied for 31st. Only Jeff Wilson and Vinnie Giles have ever finished as the low amateur in a U.S. Open and a U.S. Senior Open during the 100-year-plus history of the United States Golf Association.
Although Jeff Wilson is acknowledged to be one of the top amateur golfers in America during the past 30 years, he always felt his golfing resume was short in one category. Although he has been the medalist several times at the U.S. Mid-Am and has gotten to the semifinals in that event on two occasions, Wilson has never won a USGA national title.
All that changed for Wilson two weeks ago at Eugene CC during the United States Senior Amateur. After achieving medalist honors in the 36-hole qualifier with a 5-under-par 139, Jeff worked his way through the match play portion of the tournament, winning five matches. He found himself in the finals against defending Senior Am champ Sean Knapp of Oakmont, Pennsylvania.
The 18-hole Senior Am finale was even through nine holes. Wilson took a 2-up lead with birdies on the 13th and 15th holes. Knapp birdied the 16th hole but Wilson matched him with a clutch nine-foot birdie putt. Matching pars on the 17th hole gave Jeff Wilson of Fairfield a 2-and-1 victory over Knapp and the victory in the 2018 United States Senior Amateur. He was 4-under-par on his last eight holes and hit both par-5s in two shots to set up birdies. After competing in 34 USGA events, Jeff Wilson finally had the missing piece to a great amateur golf career.
At the awards ceremony, Wilson was quoted as saying that “I always thought I was good enough to be a USGA champion, but I never put the work in. And that shows up when the matches are on the line. This year I put the work in.” He obviously put the work in during the course of the past 12 months, winning the Southern California Match Play and the Southern California Mid-Amateur, finishing second in the NorCal Mid-Am, and attaining low amateur status at the U.S. Senior Open. His win in the Senior Amateur gets him at 10-year exemption into future Senior Ams, an invite to the 2019 U.S. Senior Open at Notre Dame, a two-year exemption into the U.S. Amateurs at Pinehurst and Bandon Dunes, and a two-year exemption into the U.S. Mid-Amateur at Charlotte CC and Colorado GC.
Jeff Wilson spent his junior golf and collegiate days playing alongside Scott McCarron, Jeff Brehaut, David and Kevin Sutherland, David Carr, Dana Banke and a host of other top-notch golfers from Northern California. One of the all-time good guys, Jeff Wilson put family and home ahead of the life of a golfing gypsy. At age 55 he is the U.S. Senior Amateur champ, which is probably a lot more prestigious than his win at the 2008 NCGA Parent-Junior, but then again Nick and I can always say we fell short because a future U.S. Senior Amateur champ as well as the U.S. Open and Senior Open low amateur, along with his talented son, beat us. There is no defense in golf and they couldn’t be stopped. Congrats to Jeff Wilson, the Senior Am champion.
