Golfers from all across the United States and several foreign countries converged on Bridgeport Country Club last week for the second instance of the American Junior Golf Association’s WVU Medicine United Hospital Junior Championship.
None measured up to hometown winner Alex Randolph, a rising sophomore at Bridgeport High School.
Randolph fired an opening-round 65, backed it up with a 66 and held off the field with a 73 in the third and final round to finish with a 9-under par 213 for a four-shot victory in a 51-player boys field.
“The course is challenging and the AJGA does a great job setting up the course,” Randolph said as a guest on Citynet Statewide Sportsline. “Really just tried to get off the tee well, and once I got into position, depending on the pins, if it was a middle pin, I was trying to attack and that’s when I was able to make my birdies. I had to make some conservative plays this week as well to go for the middle of the green.”
Tuesday’s 6-under 65 allowed Randolph to set the pace and he hardly let up the next day by carding a 66 to leave him with a four-shot lead entering Round 3.
While Randolph didn’t come all that close to matching his score from either of the first two rounds, it proved inconsequential as he entered the last 18 of the 54-hole event with a four-shot lead on Matthew Pack, a native of Chantilly, Va. Pack also shot a final round 73 and tied Hurricane’s Isaac Hayes for runner-up honors at 5-under 208.
“It’s always nice to have four insurance shots,” Randolph said. “You can’t really make any big mistakes, but it won’t necessarily cost you as much.”
Much of Randolph having some margin for error in Thursday’s final round stemmed from his ability to start strong.
“Playing well in the first round is always really important,” he said. “My dad always says you can’t always win it on the first day, but you can definitely lose it. I feel like I did a good job with that.”
As is customary in AJGA events, the boys field was comprised of players from 14 states and five countries.
There were nine West Virginia natives, and three were among the top 5 as Clarksburg native Carson Higginbotham, who is home-schooled, finished in a four-way tie for fourth at 4-under par.
A year ago, in the inaugural WVU Medicine United Hospital Junior Championship that marked the first AJGA event in West Virginia in 16 years, Randolph shot rounds of 77-71-80 and finished tied for 40th at 15-over par.
His marked improvement since then has often been on display, including last year at the WVSSAC Golf State Championships in Wheeling. It was there, on the Jones Course at Oglebay Resort’s Speidel Golf Club, where Randolph shot a 77 in the opening round to leave him in a two-way tie for second and two back of the lead in Class AAA. Randolph, then a freshman, followed it with a second-round 82 on the challenging track and settled for a two-way tie for sixth in AAA.
Already this summer, Randolph made the cut at the Future Masters at Dothan Country Club in Dothan, Ala. He carded rounds of 67-76-73 in that event and finished tied for 70th place in a field of more than 230 golfers, of which 115 made the cut.
The next week, Randolph was at or near the top of the leaderboard for much of the West Virginia Junior Amateur Championship at Canaan Valley.
Through 36 holes, Randolph was tied for first place with Tommy Evans, a rising senior at Washington High School and past WVSSAC state champion who has committed to golf collegiately at West Virginia University. Evans went on to win the event by two shots at 5-under par, while Randolph fell back into a four-way tie for sixth at 1 over after a final round 77.
That finish wasn’t what Randolph hoped for after putting himself in position for a victory, but the experience was invaluable and helped two weeks later when he finished off the AJGA event at BCC.
Quite the accomplishment for someone who’s golfed less than three full years.
“I was pretty terrible when I first picked up a club,” Randolph said. “It was a lot of work these past two and-a-half years and a lot of credit to my dad for shaping my game.
“After my first year, I played pretty much six, seven days a week and kind of fell in love with it. I really enjoyed the grind of golf, which is really important, because it’s definitely a challenging game.”
Until he began golfing, Randolph had solely focused on baseball and was part of several Bridgeport Little League state champion teams.
“With all the rotation and you really have to sink the lower and upper body together, that definitely kind of helped me learn about golf,” Randolph said. “Can kind of mix the two to work on my golf game.”
Randolph will try his hand in the West Virginia Open next week at Glade Springs and says he is hopeful to play in a few more AJGA events this year.
He also has his sights set on a strong sophomore season at BHS — one Randolph hopes he helped kickstart with the recent victory to continue a successful summer.
“I really felt the support from the whole community and couldn’t have done it without them,” Randolph said. “They gave me so much confidence throughout the week and being able to finish it out in front of all them was really cool.”