How do you define stress? A 20-man playoff at the U.S. Amateur

SAN FRANCISCO — Mason Howell bowed his head when his par bid went begging on Wednesday morning. Slump-shouldered, he shuffled off the green, where his father, Robert, greeted him with a grin.

“You’re in!” his dad said.

“I’m in?” Howell replied, looking up in disbelief.

A bogey 5 was not his best. But it was good enough to move him into match play in the U.S Amateur at the Olympic Club.

“No way I thought a 5 would do it for me,” Howell said. “But I guess in a playoff, anything can happen.”

It often does in this event. In the past 25 years, all but two U.S. Amateurs have required sudden death to fill the final slots in the Round of 64. This week was deja vu, though the logjam on the leaderboard was larger than usual, with 20 players vying for 17 spots on a damp early morning, under a blanket of coastal fog.

The action was set to start at 7:30 a.m. on the 1st hole of the Ocean Course, a monstrous 520-yard par 4. But misty conditions forced a switch to the 9th hole of the Lake Course, a shorter par 4 where the skies were clearer but the stress was every bit as thick.

“I used to have hair,” Torsten Wiedemeyer said, tapping his hand on his shiny pate as he paced the grounds. His son, Tim Weidemeyer, was part of the skirmish, and all a nervous father could do was watch. “I suppose I should be accustomed to it. He’s been doing this since he was 12. But I guess you never really get used to it.”

One man’s ulcer is another man’s excitement, and a healthy crowd had gathered around the 9th tee to watch the guys go off in five groups of four. Among them were some notable names. Filip Jakubcik of Czechia was there, the 2025 U.S. Junior Amateur medalist. So was Walker Cup hopeful — and Notre Dame star — Jacob Modleski. Plus U.S. Junior Amateur runner-up Joshua Bai of New Zealand.

All had been forced into this stressful extra session because they’d finished three over in two days of stroke play. Now, they were just trying to survive.

“Definitely not something I’d experienced before,” said Zachary Miller, a rising sophomore at Oregon State.

Playing in the first group, he’d just pulled off a ticklish up and down from behind the green on 9, and was waiting to see what his peers would do.

Most made par. The exception was Ryan Downes. The Massachusetts State amateur champ in two of the last three years, Downes stuffed his approach close on 9 and poured in a birdie, fist-pumping as his ball dropped. He’d punched his ticket into match play and erased a sour memory from the day before, when he double-bogeyed his final hole to slip back into the playoff.

“I was pretty mad at myself last night,” Downes said. “I couldn’t really eat. And I didn’t have much appetite. But I guess everything happens for a reason because I just made birdie and now I’m in.”

With no need to stick around, he strode back up the hill toward the clubhouse for breakfast.

By the time all 20 players had made it through the 9th, two — Marek Fleming of Texas and Jack Bigham of England — had bowed out with bogeys. The rest moved on to the par-4 10th, Mason Howell among them. At 18, Howell just graduated from high school but he’s on his way to play collegiate golf at the University of Georgia and has been around the competitive block, with starts in multiple USGA championships, including the 2025 U.S. Open.

But the golf gods don’t care about any of that. Moments after teeing off on 10, Howell stood crestfallen on the green, certain that his missed putt had cost him a crack at match play. Little did he know that his 5 was one better than the score posted by Emil Riegger of Florida, who, playing one group ahead, had knocked his drive into a lie so bad that several spectators had snapped pictures of it.

“Sudden death is really a different mentality,” Howell said. “I never want to root against anyone else, so I don’t look at what’s going on ahead of me. When you have this many guys, you figure that a par is probably going to be good enough to move on. So that’s what you’re trying to make. When I made bogey, I was preparing to go to another playoff hole.”

Instead, he was off to grab a bite and a breather. For the moment, his stress had subsided. If all went well in his afternoon match against Tommy Morrison, he’d be up early on Thursday, ready to feel the nerves again.