A local hero shines and a Cinderella run ends at the U.S. Amateur

SAN FRANCISCO — The clubhouse of this week’s U.S. Amateur host site is a shrine to unexpected outcomes. Just beyond the ground-floor entrance, around the corner from the grill, a grid of photographs hangs on a wall. One image shows Jack Fleck, beaming in the wake of his upset win over Ben Hogan in the 1955 U.S. Open. Another is an action shot of Billy Casper, author of his own national championship shocker when he tracked down Arnold Palmer from seven shots back in 1966. 

The themed exhibit does not end there. It includes Scott Simpson, who edged Tom Watson in 1987, and Lee Janzen, who held off Payne Stewart 11 years later, and Yuka Saso, who hoisted the U.S. Women’s Open trophy in 2021 after Lexi Thompson faltered down the stretch.

You get the picture.

Underdogs have done well at the Olympic Club.

Whether that tradition would continue was among the questions in the heavy coastal air as the quarterfinals of the U.S. Amateur got underway on Friday at the club’s historic Lake Course.

There was, after all, a Cinderella in the mix. Jimmy Abdo, a sophomore-to-be at Division III Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota, had arrived in San Francisco as the 4,992th-ranked amateur golfer in the world. The longest of long shots. But up-from-nothing journeys were nothing new to him. Born in a worn-torn Lebanon in 2006, he’d been evacuated from the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, airlifted to Cyprus, flown to Germany and then on to his adoptive family in the Midwest — all before he turned one-month old.

Now 19, he was looking to knock off Jackson Herrington of Tennessee to extend a West Coast trip that had already gone on longer than his family had planned for.

“He expects a lot of himself and we do too,” Abdo’s father, Jimmy, said as he followed his son’s match through the front nine.

Still, he conceded, “I only packed for three or four days.”

With his clean clothes running out, he’d purchased extra outfits the night before.

If the younger Abdo was an unsung quarterfinalist, another contender was a household name.

“Grip and rip it, Long John!” a fan called out as a familiar-looking figure warmed up on the range. At 21, John Daly II bears a physical resemblance to his famous dad, though his backswing is shorter and his neck-warmer hairdo is not as long. 

These days, it seems that everybody bombs it, and Daly II is no exception. But he wasn’t ready to give his fans a show. Still limbering up, he hit half wedges against a stiffening breeze. Wise move. He would need his whole game — not just driver — to dispatch his opponent, Mason Howell of Georgia, just 18 but a veteran of multiple USGA championships, including the U.S. Open at Oakmont this past summer, which he qualified for with two rounds of 63.

If Daly II prevailed, would his dad show up to watch in person over the weekend? Inquiring minds had been posing some version of this query all week as Daly II powered through the match-play bracket. His answer was as constant as it was uncertain.

“I don’t know. Maybe? You never know with him,” Daly II said.

This week marks the fourth time the Olympic Club has staged the U.S. Amateur. One prior occasion was in 1981, when Bing Crosby’s kid, Nathaniel, a Bay Area native, won the title in a clinching match that was said to have drawn the largest crowds in the history of the championship since Bobby Jones’ victory in 1930.

On Friday, the closest the field came to a local celebrity turned out to be the star of the day’s most riveting match. Glasgow-born but raised in Mill Valley, just across the bay from San Francisco, Niall Shiels-Donegan, 20, had thrilled a Crosby-size contingent of supporters on Thursday while riding a hot putter to a 1-up win over No. 1 seed Preston Stout. For his quarterfinals match, the throngs were even larger, in part because the other player was Notre Dame stalwart Jacob Modleski: a Fighting Irishman vs. a Scot.

Their head-to-head did not disappoint. With loud cheers alternating from both robust factions, Shiels-Donegan fell 2-down through 12 before draining a birdie on the par-3 13th that sent the gallery into a frenzy.

Marching to the next tee, Shiels-Donegan high-fived spectators as his caddie, Todd Moutafian, exclaimed, “Are we not entertained?”

They were.

And there was more to come, as Shiels-Donegan squared the match with a birdie on 17 before winning with a par on the first extra hole after his stray drive bounced off a tree into the fairway. Pandemonium.

“There was a little too much ‘I love you, Niall’ out there, but any form of love, I’ll take it,” Shiels-Donegan said. “I can’t thank them enough for making the trek out here. I know it’s only 30 minutes, but they’re still taking time out of their day to do this. It’s amazing they’re giving me so much support.”

Did he expect an even bigger backing in Saturday’s semifinals?

“I don’t know,” he said. “We’ve got some pretty good organizers in that bunch.”

Eventually, several other of the day’s questions were answered. John Daly Sr. would not likely be winging west over the weekend; his son had lost 1-down to Howell. Nor would the Cinderella run continue. Abdo had fallen 4 and 2. One final match remained, but it soon would be settled, with Eric Lee of Fullerton, Calif., edging out Miles Russell, a 16-year-old prodigy from Florida. 

By day’s end on the Lake Course, four players remained. The semifinals were set: Lee vs. Howell, Donegan vs. Herrington.

It was hard to find an underdog in the bunch.