NEW YORK -- Although posterity will remember the 2004 U.S. Open for the thrilling final day showdown between Phil Mickelson and Retief Goosen, the friends and family of Duke junior Nathan Smith will recall the 104th Open as a crowning moment in the Santa Cruz, Calif., native's budding golf career.
Smith shot +9 the first two rounds of competition, and although he failed to make the cut, he did prove that his game was comparable to that of the nation's best professionals, even that of Goosen, the tournament's champion, with whom Smith played a practice round.
"It was encouraging because I didn't see anything special about the majority of [the professionals]," Smith said. "I was real impressed by [Goosen's] game. I think the gap between him and a lot of the regular pros is not any more substantial than that between myself and him."
Indeed, after the first day of competition, Smith found himself right in the middle of a star-studded field with a three-over round that left him right on the cut line. Although the round started in rough fashion, with Smith bogeying the first two holes, he rebounded by birdying two of the next three holes and shooting par over the final eight holes.
The junior hit 10 greens over the course of the round, a considerable feat considering that only seven of the 66 golfers who made the cut exhibited equal accuracy off the tee in the opening 18 holes.
On the tournament's second day, however, when several golfers were putting up subpar rounds, Smith headed in the wrong direction. The Duke junior hit only half of his fairways and was on the green in regulation only 39 percent of the time en route to a +6 performance.
"I really didn't hit the ball off the tee that badly," Smith said. "I think it more had to do with not hitting good shots into the greens. I just did some stupid stuff, I made a couple of doubles that really cost me.... I had a chance to make the cut. I was standing at five-over, which was the cut number, with four holes to go, but I made a double and two more bogies. After that double I lost a little bit of concentration."
In the middle of that three-hole stretch was the infamous Redan hole, a par 3 that Smith bogeyed twice and proved troublesome for almost every golfer on the course.
"[Redan] was playing pretty tough," Smith said. "I was in the short-left bunker both days. I didn't think it was a bad spot to be--the first round I hit it out pretty close and made par, and in the second round I hit another good shot that probably was within 10 feet of the pin and came back into the bunker. That was rough.... I thought the way the hole played on the weekend was much tougher than it played the first two days."
Another golfer who had problems with Shinnecock's shorter holes was former Duke star Joe Ogilvie, who made the cut and finished the tournament in 40th place with a +17 score, but scored eleven over par on the par threes.
Ogilvie sat at +9 with one round of golf remaining, but like the rest of the field, was humbled mightily by the course's final round setup. The Austin, Texas native had tamed Shinnecock's hilly par 4s in the first three rounds, shooting one over par. In the final round of competition, however, Ogilvie shot +6 on the same holes.
2003 graduate Leif Olson failed to make the cut and shot +13 over the first two days of the tournament.
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