Scarlet Sunrise: Ohio State men's golf standout Neal Shipley finishes second in U.S. Amateur
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Ohio State men’s golf standout Neal Shipley finishes second in U.S. Amateur
Ohio State men’s golf graduate student Neal Shipley has qualified for next year’s Masters and U.S. Open with a runner-up finish at the U.S. Amateur over the weekend.
Shipley won five matches and became the first Ohio State finalist in the event since Chris Perry in 1983. Buckeyes alum John Cook won it all in 1978, as did Jack Nicklaus in both 1959 and 1961.
Shipley’s impressive run started with him getting through stroke play with rounds of 69 and 73. Where he dominated at Cherry Hills Country Club in Colorado, however, was match play.
Shipley won one match on Wednesday, two on Thursday, another on Friday and one more — his second straight comeback victory — on Saturday. The final win of that batch occurred in the semifinals and featured a wedge shot with back spin that got the crowd going.
Shipley went toe-to-toe with Nick Dunlap for most of the championship match on Sunday. They each shot 66 through the opening 18 holes. Eventually, Dunlap separated with incredible efficiency on the green.
Nevertheless, Shipley’s 157 holes of golf over the last week were remarkable in themselves. He now has four runner-up finishes this summer. He also wound up second at The Dogwood Invitational, the Sunnehanna Amateur and the Trans-Mississippi Amateur Championship.
Shipley is entering his second season at Ohio State. He’s gone from outside the top 1000 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings to just outside the top 100 in about a year. Last year, he posted five top-20 finishes and ranked second on the Buckeyes with an average score of 72.72.
Two more first-year Buckeyes players shed black stripe in training camp
As Ohio State football training camp wears on, more and more Buckeyes players are losing their black stripes. Next up, after Ohio State’s second preseason scrimmage, were another pair of true freshmen: wide receiver Noah Rogers and defensive tackle Kayden McDonald.
Rogers became the third Ohio State wideout in the 2023 class to shed his black stripe, joining Carnell Tate and Bryson Rodgers. Rogers’ name has recently been mentioned in the same breath as Tate, when the potential immediate offensive impact of Buckeyes’ new receivers is discussed. He impressed in spring ball, including in the spring game when he broke three tackles during a 57-yard, catch-and-run score.
Unlike Rogers — an early enrollee — McDonald arrived at Ohio State in the summer. McDonald was the No. 273 overall prospect and the No. 37 defensive lineman in the 2023 class, according to the On3 Industry Ranking. The North Gwinnett product turned in a senior season in Suwanee, Georgia, that saw him pile up 68 tackles and, most notably, 13 sacks and a staggering 40 tackles for loss. The 6-foot-2, 319-pound interior D-Lineman also added 409 yards and 11 touchdowns on the ground that season.
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For more on Rogers, go here. And for more on McDonald receiving the post-practice honor, go here.
Ohio State quarterback battle entering crunch time after second camp scrimmage
At this point, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day could announce the Buckeyes’ starting quarterback any day. That could be Monday, or he could push the decision down the line and name QB1 just before the season opener at Indiana on Sept. 2. Or he could even play both junior Kyle McCord and redshirt freshman Devin Brown into the season and use game data to help inform his choice.
The latter option is the path Michigan took last season when it was picking between now-Iowa quarterback Cade McNamara and upstart J.J. McCarthy. McCarthy earned the job after a Week 2 win over Hawaii, and head coach Jim Harbaugh never looked back.
Day has maintained, though, that he’d like one of his quarterbacks emerge before the start of the season. But separation has apparently been hard to come by in the back-and-forth competition.
Lettermen Row’s Tim May has the latest on the two-way race for starting quarterback. Check it out here.
Counting down
Buckeyes vs. Indiana: 12 days
Buckeyes vs. Michigan: 96 days
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