Birthday boy Tristin Goodwin bucks trend, becoming youngest winner of Colorado PGA Professional Championship in 40 years
By Gary Baines – 9/11/2024
CENTENNIAL — Happy birthday, Tristin Goodwin. For your gift, here’s a Colorado PGA Professional Championship trophy — and a $14,250 winner’s check.
Oh, and by the way, at age 29, you’re the youngest champion of the CPGA’s most prestigious title since 1984, when Gregg Jones won it at age 27.
Speaking of age, Goodwin bucked a trend in a big way. In nine of the last 11 Colorado PGA Professional Championships prior to this year, a player older than 50 had won. And the other two champions — actually in both cases Geoff Keffer of Lakewood Country Club — were in their late 30s or early 40s.
Now, Goodwin, who could be most of those players’ son, will have his name etched on the same trophy and theirs. The PGA assistant professional at Cherry Hills Country Club used a stellar start to Wednesday’s final round — how does 6 under par after six holes sound? — as a catalyst to turning a two-stroke deficit into a two-shot victory at Valley Country Club.
How’s that as a way to celebrate?
“I would say it’s been a pretty good birthday,” Goodwin said with a big smile.
Tristin Goodwin tries to coax in a birdie attempt on Wednesday.
As for striking a blow for twenty-somethings after older players have had an impressive run for over a decade, the newly minted 29-year-old played it modestly.
“This Section has a lot of tough players and it just happens to be that they’re a little older than mostly everybody else,” Goodwin said. “I was grateful to play with those guys. (In the first two rounds) I played with Matt Schalk and Doug Rohrbaugh; it was very impressive play by those guys. I theoretically have an advantage; I hit it past them. But they still hit lasers right at the flag and make putts. They’re great golfers. There’s something to be said about all these champions. It doesn’t really matter how old you are.”
The last player in his 20s — prior to Wednesday — who won this event was Matt Call, who was just shy of his 30th birthday when he prevailed in 2007.
This pitch on No. 12 on Wednesday led to a birdie that gave Goodwin the outright lead for good.
After coming into the day two out of the lead — held by Keffer, a two-time champion and eight-time Colorado PGA Dow Finsterwald Player of the Year — Goodwin rocketed into the top spot by starting Wednesday’s round par, birdie, birdie, birdie, eagle, birdie. In fact, he led by three at that point.
“He played great,” Keffer said of Goodwin. “He came out firing. He could have easily made four or five eagles in a row.”
As it was, Goodwin holed out for eagle from about 40 yards on No. 5, interrupting his run of birdies.
“I was just hitting the ball very well,” said the Durango native, who grew up in nearby Farmington, N.M. “The front nine is very gettable. I just gave myself some opportunities to score, and I’m happy I got out to a hot start because I knew Geoff was right there. I had to come out hot if I had any intention of winning today.”
Regarding his hole-out eagle, he noted, “I had two eagle looks on the two previous holes — within 15 feet — but I missed them. Then the eagle that I made, I actually hold out from about 40 yards.”
Geoff Keffer was trying to win the Colorado PGA Professional Championship for the third time.
Though Keffer caught Goodwin on No. 9 — and shared the lead from there through 11 — a two-shot swing on No. 12 gave Goodwin the top spot alone for good. He ended up shooting a 5-under-par 67 on Wednesday, leaving him at 10 under overall, two better than Keffer, who closed with a 71.
“I was hoping (Goodwin’s early run) would last and I would lose to a 59,” said Keffer, who won the Colorado PGA Professional Championship in 2016 and ’20, the latter at Valley CC.
Though it proved to be a two-man race for the title, Mike Weingartner of The Links Golf Course claimed third place at 4 under par after matching Keffer’s 71.
Mike Weingartner finished a distant third on Wednesday.
In the tournament within the tournament, the top eight finishers earned spots into the 2025 national PGA Professional Championship, set for April 27-30 in Port St. Lucie, Fla.: Goodwin, Keffer, Weingartner, Robert Grall from Colorado National Golf Club (-3), three-time defending CPGA Professional Champion Micah Rudosky from Conquistador Golf Course (-1), Jordan Gibbs from Denver Country Club (-1), Ben Lanting from Bear Creek Golf Club (-1) and Kirk Trowbridge from MetaGolf Learning Center (even, then winning a playoff). Rudosky and Lanting had gone 1-2 at each of the past three Colorado PGA Professional Championships.
Keffer’s quest for a third title in the tournament was hampered substantially by a lower right back problem that reared its head on his 13th hole of the second round, where it led him to hit a smother hook out of bounds. He played his final six holes in 2 over on Tuesday, and the condition didn’t improve much overnight. Especially down the stretch on Wednesday — he played his last seven holes in 2 over — Keffer was clearly battling some pain.
“It wasn’t better this morning,” the 46-year-old said. “I figured I could still get it around and qualify (for the 2025 national championship). That’s all I was really trying to do. I wished I could have felt a little better and given (Goodwin) a little bit better run.
“As the round went on (the back) got tighter and tighter. I had to really force my body to turn. There was nothing normal today. … Right above the right hip it just locks and I can’t really turn, so things go very poorly.
“I feel good about qualifying. I have a pretty decent feeling about the tournament, but disappointed that that happened at the end of yesterday and I had to improvise today. I made it around. I don’t know how many more swings I had in me. We got it in. That’s all that matters.”
Keffer’s back proved problematic on Wednesday, particularly late in the round.
After missing four straight 8-10 foot putts in the middle of the round, Goodwin finally got one to fall at No. 12, where he drained a 15-foot birdie putt. That’s also where Keffer three-putted for bogey, putting Goodwin up by two.
Keffer narrowed the gap to one the final time on the drivable par-4 16th, when he got up and down for a tap-in birdie and Goodwin three-putted for par. But the lead returned to two a hole later when Goodwin got up and down for par by making a breaking 7-footer and Keffer bogeyed after being just in front of the green in two on the par-4.
On 18, Keffer had one last outside chance, but he missed a 10-foot birdie try on the par-5, while Goodwin sank a 4-foot par putt he had left himself.
Goodwin (left) and Keffer shake hands after an eventful final round.
So, just 18 months after moving to Colorado and the PGA Section here, Goodwin earned its most prestigious title. It came a year after he won the season-long CPGA Match Play in 2023.
“This is the best tournament I’ve ever won,” said Goodwin, a former New Mexico 4A state high school runner-up who walked on as a college player at New Mexico State after transferring into the Professional Golf Management program there. “I never won anything in college and I went to the Met Section (in New York) after college and won a few Assistants events, but nothing this big. So this means a lot. And this is definitely the biggest check I’ve ever made. There’s something to be said about that. Hopefully this is a good steppingstone to keep moving forward.
“I’m very overwhelmed and surprised at my play today. I don’t usually expect to play well — it just goes into managing my expectations — but I was very happy to play well and very happy to end up getting the job done.”
For all the scores from the Colorado PGA Professional Championship, 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