Salt Lake City's Kelsey Chugg won two sets of three consecutive holes, yet ended up losing Thursday's final match of the U.S. Women's Mid-Amateur at Norwood Hills Country Club in St. Louis.
Shannon Johnson of Massachusetts birdied the 18th hole for a 1-up victory over Chugg, the defending champion. Among golfers who were living in Utah at the time, Chugg would have become the first player to claim two USGA titles.
Chugg twice was 2 down, but immediately responded each time by winning the next three holes in a match that featured five lead changes. The second run sent her 1 up through No. 15, but Johnson tied her with a birdie on the par-4 No. 16 and then won with another birdie on the par-5 No. 18. Chugg's 10-foot birdie attempt slid past the hole.
“Kelsey really didn’t miss too many putts all day, and I thought for sure we were going to go to extra holes,” Johnson said.
“It was just an incredible match,” Chugg said. “I felt like I played as well as I could have. I would have loved the putt go in on the last hole, but I really feel like I did a great job of hanging on, and she's just an incredible player.”
Chugg, 27, went 11-1 in two years of match play in the U.S. Women's Mid-Am, for golfers 25 and older. Johnson, 35, was the 2016 runner-up in the event.
Chugg, a former Weber State golfer who works for the Utah Golf Association, competed in several major events in 2018 as a USGA reigning champion. She played in the South American Amateur, the U.S. Women’s Open, the U.S. Women’s Amateur and an exhibition connected to the U.S. Open before defending her title in the Mid-Am.
“It's been an incredible year,” she said.
The only golfers with Utah ties who have multiple USGA championships are the late Billy Casper, who won two U.S. Opens and a U.S. Senior Open, and Johnny Miller, who won U.S. Junior Amateur and U.S. Open titles before and after his BYU golf career. They were not living in Utah at the time of their U.S. Open wins, though.
