Kaysville’s Cole Ponich beat BYU teammate Cooper Jones’s fast-spinning albatross to win the 126th Utah Amateur

BYU’s Cole Ponich hoists the championship trophy after winning the 126th Utah Amateur Championship at Ogden Golf & Country Club in Ogden, Saturday, July 13, 2024. By Isaac Hale, Deseret News

In other words, that was BYU golfer Cole Ponich’s reaction when Cougar teammate Cooper Jones hit a potentially game-breaking albatross on the 24th hole of the scheduled 36-hole championship match of the 126th Utah Amateur golf tournament on Saturday at Ogden Golf & Country Club. An albatross is also known as a double eagle, which in this case was a par on the 584-yard par-5 OG&CC 6th hole.

Ponich, 24, never trailed, but a hole-in-one by Jones, 20, cut Ponich’s lead to four holes, and the rising BYU senior turned to his caddy and said, “Now we’re going to have to play a little.” Golf. … Now it will really be a match. “”

And that’s exactly what Ponych did, recovering well enough to finally win in 2 and 1 and forever poison his name in amateur knowledge in the lunar of Utah.

The high product of Kaysville and Davis is the third contractual player by Byu, who won Am, joining the ZAC Jones Sr. Cooper-S 2022 in Soldier Hollow and Simon Kwon since last year in the Cantri Salt Lake- Cantri. A transfer from Cal, Kwon wasn’t technically a Cougar when he beat David Liechty in the finals last year, but he had already given a quiet commitment to coach Bruce Brockbank.

“It hasn’t set in yet. It will probably take a day or two, but it feels good,” Ponich said. “I mean, my hands were shaking pretty good, even though I only had to make two putts from 15 feet (on the 17th hole, the 35th of the match) to win. It’s going to take time, but I feel so good right now.

BYU’s Cooper Jones (left) celebrates with BYU golfer Cole Ponich during the final round of the 126th Utah State Amateur Championship at Ogden Golf and Country Club in Ogden, Saturday, July 13, 2024. Isaac Hale, Deseret News

After shaking hands with Jones and his father, Russ, Jones’ youngest son, Ponich reunited with his mother and gave Becky Ponich a big hug. Ponich was once one of the best junior golfers in the state, if not the country, but has dealt with back injuries and other setbacks in recent years that forced her to rejoin the BYU team last spring.

“I mean, she knows what I’ve been through the last two years,” Ponich said. “Like I said, I’ve been away from competitive golf for a while. To go from being one of the best juniors in the country to enduring several years of struggle, adversity and injuries is tough,” he said. “We both know how much we’ve improved over the last few months, and she’s really proud of me.”

Ponich played well in stroke-play qualifying, finishing in second place after Tuesday’s round, but needed 22 holes to eliminate Caleb Norton. So while Saturday’s marathon wasn’t necessarily his toughest event, he said it tested his nerves more than he’s ever experienced before. After 18 holes and a lunch break, he led by four holes and extended his lead to five by the time Jones left the fairway on the sixth hole, a hole that wasn’t needed because of a problem with Ponic, and Jones was given a two-stroke penalty for checking if the ball was his before marking it.

“If you’re not nervous the whole distance and have a small lead to win the State Am, I don’t think you care enough,” Ponic said. “I felt it.”

BYU’s COLE PONCH will knock out the ball from the bunker in the 126th Utachampionship finals held at Ogden Golf & Country Club in Ogden on Saturday, July 13, 2024. | ISAAC HALE, Deseret News

Surprisingly, Ponich rarely played the state this year. He registered a week before the start of qualifying but was rejected from six different qualifiers because he registered too late. He qualified for the Hurricanes, about a four-hour drive from his home in Kaysville, and while there, he entered the field of 156 players in Ogden. “I definitely didn’t go in there thinking, ‘I’m going to win this whole tournament,’” he said. “But the goal going into the summer was just to play as many tournaments as possible and get back into competitive shape for the next (college) season.”

After Jones made the double eagle, Ponich ran over and gave him a celebratory hug, saying he was “really happy for him” and that he had never seen a double eagle before. “In other words, we encourage ourselves all day,” Ponic said. “You don’t come to anyone, especially for your friends.”

Jones, who appeared twice at the Corn Felets event, cut one, and had already spent a spectacular summer, left Sunday in South Amatin, Lexington, Kentucky. He lamented the defeat of the putter, which suddenly became stubborn after wearing it Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

“I was talking yesterday about my putter on fire,” he said. “I feel like that wasn’t there today, there’s a lot of burn on the edges. … No putts fell today.”

As for the albatross, Jones said it was the first time in his golfing career that he’d ever seen one. He hit a 4-iron from 241 yards, “barely” cleared the bunker to 221 yards, and the ball hit the flagstick before settling in the bottom of the cup. “That’s pretty cool,” he said. “The first double-headed eagle. At least it was really cool to express that today.

Jones, like Ponich, Zach Jones, Tyson and Jackson Shelley and Peter Kim, won’t play for the Cougars this fall. He’ll be serving a two-year church mission in Peru starting in September. “I’m happy for Cole,” Jones said. “Like I said yesterday, it’s always good when a Coug wins state. I wish it was me, but Cole deserves it.”

In fact, to get to the championship match, Ponich had to beat some of the state’s top amateurs, including former champion Dan Horner (1st), Oklahoma State University graduate and Bonneville High School student Parker Bunn (2nd and 1st), former BYU star Elijah Turner (3rd and 1st) and University of Utah’s Davis Johnson (4th and 3rd). “It was always on the bucket list, even if I didn’t play much, most of my careers were busy with the golf junior,” said Snick. But that was really my goal. Winning the final State Amateur means a lot.