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Utah Senior State Am, Day 2: Three-time champion Brigham Gibbs rallies to win in round of 16

This is what can happen when a tournament such as the Utah Senior State Amateur Championship uses a one-day, stroke-play seeding format.

Three-time champion Brigham Gibbs posted a 76 in the qualifying round at Hill Air Force Base’s Hubbard Memorial Golf Course, settling for the No. 21 seed in match play. That gave him a difficult path to a fourth title.

Three time Utah Senior State Amateur champion, Brigham Gibbs.

He’s succeeding so far. Gibbs topped No. 12 Eric Yergensen 5 and 4 in Tuesday morning’s round of 32, then won Nos. 16 and 18 in a 1-up victory over No. 28 Jon Morgan in the afternoon. And now, his road presumably gets even tougher, with a rematch against 2023 runner-up Shane McMillan, the No. 4 seed.

Wednesday’s schedule lists the quarterfinals and semifinals in the Senior and Super-Senior divisions and the semifinals in the Legends group. The 18-hole final matches in all categories will be played Thursday morning.

Former champion, Jon Wright.

No. 1 seed John Owen played a total of 30 holes to win two matches Tuesday, while 2020 champion Jon Wright had an even lighter workload of 26 holes.

Morgan competed in the only extra-holes match in the round of 32. He was 3 down vs. Andrew Yeh through 13 holes, but rallied to win in 19. Darren Kuhn, the 2022 champion, was a 1-up winner over Troy Jones in the only other match that went to No. 18. Kuhn then topped Matthew Lyons 2 and 1 in one of the round of 16’s featured matches.

The other Senior quarterfinalists are Brett Christiansen, David Booth and Kevin Campbell.

SUPER-SENIORS

Rick Lloyd and Paul Cannon teamed up to win the Super-Senior division of the 2023 Utah Four-Ball Championship, and they’ll play together again next week in the semifinals at Gladstan Golf Course. As of Tuesday, though, they were rivals. Lloyd took a 5-and-4 victory in the Super-Senior (60-over) round of 16 at Hubbard.

The day’s longest match in any category was John Harris’ 22-hole victory over Mark Gardiner, the Super-Senior winner of the Utah Senior Stroke Play Championship in May. Harris birdied the par-4 No. 4 to win.

2023 Super-Senior champion, Craig Wilson.

Defending champion Craig Wilson, the No. 1 seed, advanced with a 3-and-2 defeat of Scott Benson.

LEGENDS

Utah Golf Hall of Fame member Todd Barker rallied from 2 down through 14 holes to overtake David Fischer in the quarterfinals of the Legends (70-over) competition. Barker birdied No. 18 to extend the match and birdied the par-5 No. 1 to win in 19 holes.

In another extra-holes match, champion Doug Marriott went 21 holes before winning over Rob Bachman.

Larry Beach will face Michael Hacker in Wednesday’s semifinals of the Legends division.

No. 1 seed Larry Beech, meanwhile, played only 13 holes vs. Charlie Davis, winning 6 and 5. In 2021, Beech won the Super-Senior division, then consisting of 65-over players.

Michael Hacker, the Legends runner-up in the Senior Stroke Play, is the other semifinalist.

Click here for Tuesday’s bracket scoring.

Day two recap story written by Fairways Media senior writer Kurt Kragthorpe. All photos provided by Fairways Media/Garrit Johnson.