Amateur golf tournament season in SC could get going in late May

Jordan Sease forged a golf season to cherish in 2019, winning multiple titles, earning the South Carolina Golf Association’s Player of the Year award and qualifying for this year’s U.S. Amateur Four-Ball.

Playing with former Winthrop teammate Kyle Bearden, Sease looked forward “to a fun trip” and planned to use the USGA Four-Ball tourney in Philadelphia to launch his 2020 season with a goal of matching’s last year’s success.

That must wait. Or perhaps only the venue will be different.

The coronavirus outbreak forced the USGA to cancel the Four-Ball, a decision Sease called “definitely disappointing but right thing to do. It’s tough luck, but (the pandemic) is obviously more serious than golf.”

Now, Sease, who played at Lexington High prior to Winthrop, hopes to begin his tournament season about the same time in late May in the S.C. Golf Association’s Four-Ball championship at Musgrove Mill Golf Club in Clinton.

The SCGA has suspended all events through May 10, leaving the possibility open that the state tournament can be played on schedule (May 20-24).

“We’ll miss Philadelphia, but we will get to play about the same time if the schedule doesn’t change,” Sease said. “I have been playing against some good competition on weekends at the Country Club of Lexington, and I’m playing OK ... just not as much as usual coming out of the winter.”

Of course, his “playing OK” is a game most golfers would love to have. A project manager for an architectural firm, he gave the pros a fling after Winthrop, then earned his master’s degree at Clemson and settled into a prototypical mid-amateur.

His 2019 season included:

▪ Individual wins in the SCGA Mid-Amateur and the Festival of Flowers plus co-medalist in U.S. Mid-Amateur sectional qualifying;

▪ Team titles in the Devlin Four-Ball with Walt Todd Jr. at the Secession Club in Beaufort, the SCGA Mid-Amateur Four-Ball with Brandon Truesdale at the Dunes Club in Myrtle Beach and co-medalist in sectional qualifying for the 2020 U.S. Amateur Four-Ball with Bearden;

▪ Competing in the U.S. Mid-Amateur in Colorado, top 20 finishes in the South Carolina Amateur, Carolinas Amateur and the Carolinas Mid-Amateur along with a sixth in the Baltusrol Four-Ball with Todd.

The pandemic has caused uncertainty among schedules, but he said, “A good thing for us is a lot of the mid-am events (for golfers 25 and older) are in the fall. But right now, it’s wait and see.”

Among other events, he hopes to play in the State and Carolinas Mid-Amateurs, the State and Carolinas Amateurs, some four-balls and looks to qualify for the 2021 Amateur Four-Ball. Trying to qualify for the U.S. Amateur is a possibility.

Playing Four-Ball events “gives you an opportunity to be a little more aggressive,” he said. “We can get a second opinion on putts and talk about which clubs to hit, but we most play our own games.

“We play well together. Kyle usually tees off first and puts his drive in the middle of the fairway.”

That leaves Sease free to unload one of his bombs off the tee, or, as he has said, “Distance has never been a problem for me.”

If conditions permit for him — and others — to do that in tournaments in May, that would be a welcome sign in the battle against the coronavirus.

Chip shots. Ping’s All-Region men’s golf teams included Jamie Wilson (USC), Jacob Bridgeman and Turk Pettit (Clemson), Logan Sowell (College of Charleston), Zack Taylor (Coastal Carolina), Reid Bedell (USC Upstate), Trent Phillips (Inman/Georgia) and Andrew Orishak (Hilton Head Island/Virginia). . . . The World Long Drive Tour, which had events scheduled at Fort Jackson Golf Club and Par Tee Golf Center, has cancelled its 2020 season due to the coronavirus outbreak. Officials remain hopeful for a championship competition and will announce detail after completing plans. . . . Amateur associations in the Carolinas hope to resume competition in mid-May and are accepting “pending” entries for tournaments. “It’s a lot easier to cancel than re-open entries at the last minute,” said Clarissa Childs, executive director of the Women’s South Carolina Golf Association.