More Mature Spieth Focused On U.S. Junior Amateur Title

After reaching semis as a 14 year old in 2008, Dallas resident looking for better results at Trump National

By Ken Klavon, USGA

Bedminster, N.J. – Jordan Spieth shoved in the ear buds, hit the iPod play button and blocked out the world around. It was drive time.

Thwack! Thwack! Thwack! Each ball, lost in the clear-blue sky, offered imperceptible differences as they released. Yet Spieth knew. For each swing represented a mini-step toward goals he has set for himself.

Jordan Spieth came close to becoming the youngest champion in Junior Amateur history last year at Shoal Creek. (Steven Gibbons/USGA)

Buoyed by unbreakable concentration, he continued a longing quest to lay claim to what could have been his last year at Shoal Creek. Very few knew about Spieth, then a lumbering 14 year old who announced his arrival onto the national junior golf landscape by advancing to the U.S. Junior Amateur semifinals in his first appearance. Little did he know it then, but had Spieth won, the Dallas, Texas, resident would have replaced Tiger Woods as the event’s youngest champion by six months.

Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

Here he is again at the U.S. Junior Amateur, a year wiser, carrying a multitude of accolades in his tow. Last fall he won the prestigious 2008 PING Invitational, one of the premier events on the American Junior Golf Association circuit. This year, he successfully defended his HP Byron Nelson Junior Championship. Then in March, he added a third AJGA win.

At the Thunderbird International Junior, another AJGA major, Spieth bogeyed two of his last four holes after being in the lead. It led to a fifth-place finish. The setback didn’t deter Sports Illustrated from calling to do a portrait shot of him for its July 13 edition.

“My friends were loving it,” said Spieth. “It was a lot of fun to do the shoot.”

Spieth was predisposed to a lesson in losing the semifinal match to Evan Beck last year. The junior-to-be at Dallas Jesuit knew then that he wasn’t ready to win after falling 4 down early but getting as close as 1 down in the match. For some reason, the title that had eluded him also ignited a passion to chase it. Since then, he has matured into one of the premier junior players in the country. Cameron McCormick, Brook Hollow Golf Club's director of instruction, helped tweak his swing.

“When I got to the semifinals,” said Spieth Sunday at Trump National Golf Club, “I thought, ‘Wow, I’m one match away from winning this.’ Then it all set in.”

Having no match-play experience on his résumé didn’t seem to intimidate him. But when he had time to mull over the loss, Spieth listed a bevy of things he could have done different. He also jotted down goals. A Junior Amateur victory was one of them.

In order to obtain it, though, he may have to dial back expectations. That is, if he pays attention to 16-year-old Anthony Paolucci’s plight these past two years. He should since the two are good friends from the Dallas area.

At Boone Valley Golf Club in 2007, Paolucci, much like Spieth last year, burst through match play and found himself staring down eventual champion Cory Whitsett in the final. Whitsett had little problem with Paolucci, handing the then-14 year old an 8-and-7 thrashing.

Last year at Shoal Creek, Paolucci never got untracked. He failed to qualify for match play, leaving him red-faced.

“At Boone Valley,” said Paolucci via phone Sunday, “I was just trying to make the cut. Last year, after going as far as a I did, I was trying to win it. But I made too many mental mistakes, and it became just the opposite. I was just trying to make match play after that.

“I made a triple bogey and a double bogey later. That’s five over right there.”

Paolucci, also in this year’s Junior field, pressed to shoot a low number in the second round of stroke play that didn’t materialize. In his estimation now, had he simply looked for pars and nothing worse than a bogey, he might have been fine. He offered Spieth advice, considering the danger points of Trump’s Old Course, while doing so. Players will play both the Old and New courses in stroke-play qualifying.

“You can recover from bogeys on this course,” said Paolucci. “You can’t recover from double bogeys.”

“It’s what you do around the greens,” said Zach Wanderscheid, 17, who knows and plays with reigning champion Cameron Peck, who has since turned 18 and is no longer eligible for the Junior Amateur. “But there are some players out there who can’t handle that.”

The odds say that Spieth should be one of the 64 players who should be able to handle it. If he does, and can go far again in match play, he’ll take another step toward his goal of not only being the top junior, but also the country’s top amateur.

If he doesn’t, he’ll go the route of Paolucci in that he’ll need to re-prove himself all over again. Paolucci said the danger lies in the mind-set.

 “What you’ve got to do in medal play is to make some putts,” said Paolucci. “Jordan does that well. Anytime there’s a par or bogey at stake, he gets off with nothing worse.”

And it just might be enough to get Spieth where he needs to go.

Ken Klavon is the USGA’s editor of digital media. E-mail him with questions or comments at kklavon@usga.org.