34th Oregon Senior Men's Amateur to Begin Sept. 5 at OGA Golf Course
WOODBURN, ORE. – The 34th Oregon Senior Men’s Amateur Championship will take place September 5-8, 2017 at the OGA Golf Course in Woodburn, Ore.
With the playing of the Oregon Senior Women’s Amateur earlier this summer, next week’s championship will feature 70 of the best senior men’s players in Oregon and SW Washington.
Leading the field is Pat O’Donnell (Happy Valley, Ore.), five-time Oregon Senior Men’s Amateur champion and winner of the event the last three years (2008, 2010, 2014-16). O’Donnell, one of the most accomplished senior amateur golfers in the Pacific Northwest, won his eighth Oregon Senior Men’s Stroke Play title earlier this summer. He was named the OGA Golfer of the Year in 2016, and has also had success nationally – he finished runner-up at the 2013 U.S. Senior Amateur Championship.
Along with O’Donnell, three more former champions of this event are playing next week – Scott Hval (Portland, Ore. – 2011-13), Brad Skreen (West Linn, Ore. – 2006), and Chris Maletis (Portland, Ore. – 2000-02). Hval most recently advanced to the final of the 2nd Oregon Amateur Four-Ball Championship with his playing partner, Randy Mahar (Portland, Ore.), who is also in the field this week. Hval is a former Oregon Amateur and Oregon Mid-Amateur champion. Maletis is a four-time Oregon Senior Men’s Stroke Play champion (2011, 2004-05, 1999) and won the Open Division at the Men’s Stroke Play in 1995.
Also in the field this year is Bob Harrington (Portland, Ore.) and Denny Taylor (Gladstone, Ore.). Both players qualified for last year’s U.S. Senior Amateur Championship. Taylor won the Oregon Senior Men’s Stroke Play Championship back in 2002. Former Oregon Amateur Champions Gay Davis (Portland, Ore. – 1966, 1980) will be playing, along with last year’s runner-up in this championship, Tom Zupan (Portland, Ore.).
Two players from Oregon and SW Washington who played in this year’s U.S. Senior Amateur Championship will be making their return to regional competition next week – Brad Karns (Vancouver, Wash.) and Brad Carey (Lake Oswego, Ore.).
This will mark the second OGA Championship that the OGA Golf Course has hosted in 2017. Last month the facility hosted the 33rd Oregon Net Championship. The course has also been the host site for numerous USGA Championship qualifiers this year and in past seasons.
