For second straight year, CU’s Dylan McDermott advances to match play at U.S. Amateur; in round of 64, he’ll face red-hot Luke Clanton
By Gary Baines – 8/13/2024
For the third consecutive year, the University of Colorado men’s golf team will have one of its players in the match play portion of the U.S. Amateur.
Two years after CU’s Justin Biwer advanced to the round of 16 at the U.S. Am, and a year after he himself made it to the round of 64 at Cherry Hills Country Club, Dylan McDermott on Tuesday assured himself of a second straight trip to match play at the world’s most prestigious amateur golf championship.
McDermott, a senior-to-be at CU from Granite Bay, Calif., finished 32nd in the stroke-play portion of the 2024 U.S. Am in Chaska, Minn., posting rounds of 67-74 for a 1-under-par total. That means the left-hander will begin match play with an 8:40 a.m. (MT) round-of-64 face-off against Luke Clanton of Hialeah, Fla., on Wednesday at Hazeltine National.
Clanton, a Florida State golfer, has been causing a bit of a stir in the golf world in recent months as he’s posted three top-10 finishes this summer on the PGA Tour, placing 10th in the Rocket Mortgage Classic, second in the John Deere Classic and fifth late Sunday at the Wyndham Championship. In addition, he made the cut and ended up 41st at the U.S. Open. This week, he became the No. 1 player in the World Amateur Golf Rankings.
McDermott, competing in his third straight U.S. Am, almost had a CU teammate join him in match play as Brandon Knight missed a playoff for the final match-play berths by one stroke. As it was Knight (73-70) tied for 68th place in stroke play.
One other player with some Colorado ties has a chance to make match play as Gunnar Broin, who played at Colorado State in the 2020-21 season, will be involved in a 14-man playoff for the final 11 match-play spots on Monday morning. Broin, who now plays for Kansas and who also qualified for the 2024 U.S. Open, carded rounds of 74-68, good for a tie for 54th place.
Here are the scores of all the golfers with major Colorado ties at the U.S. Amateur, which started with a field of 312 players:
32. CU golfer Dylan McDermott 67-74—141
54. Former CSU golfer Gunnar Broin 74-68–142
Failed to Make Match Play
68. CU golfer Brandon Knight 73-70–143
86. Connor Jones, Westminster 68-76—144
86. CSU golfer Christoph Bleier 69-75–144
117. Colin Prater, Colorado Springs 75-70–145
137. CU golfer Ty Holbrook 70-76—146
248. Miles Kuhl, Boulder 81-72–153
269. Cole Nygren, Denver 77-78—155
311. Colorado School of Mines golfer Lukas Taggart 83-85–168
For all the U.S. Amateur results, CLICK HERE.
About the Writer: Gary Baines has covered golf in Colorado continuously since 1983. He was a sports writer at the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, then the sports editor there, and has written regularly for ColoradoGolf.org since 2009. The University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2022. He owns and operates ColoradoGolfJournal.com