Jug Mountain Ranch asks players to be patient.
The golf course, as Joe Malay put it after his opening round, asks you to play it the way the way it was designed to be played — from point A to point B, and only then may you advance on to point C. To disobey, you must push two shots and a golf ball into the middle of the table and roll a die weighted against your favor. And when you lose, you’ll be forced to withstand anxious walks along the edges of meadows so lush you’re better off not finding your ball.
Jug Mountain is a reliable test of resilience — and resilience may be the best word to describe 2024’s trio of Champions. Fran Matthias fought his way back from an opening 81 to run away with his third consecutive Super Senior Title. Jennifer Harper earned her first IGA Championship title from five-shots back. And Darren Kuhn, a six-time runner up finisher in IGA Championships (including the 2024 Senior Match Play), outlasted newly minted senior Brian Swenson in a two-hole playoff.
SUPER SENIOR
Fran Matthias cruised out of the gate on Thursday morning with squeaky-clean 36, making nine consecutive pars as he rolled into Jug Mountain's feast or famine final nine. A bogey on the 10th and a second on the 12th (the week’s easiest par-4) then sent him trending in the wrong direction. When he arrived on the 16th tee, the beginning of Jug’s most notorious stretch, at three-over par a leftward tee shot found the penalty area.
“I had a brain fart and should have taken a drop,” Matthias said. “That was kind of silly on my part.”
It took Matthias three swings to free his ball from the lush native area beyond the red line and he chased his ball into the hole for a quadruple-bogey nine. Two more bogeys on the troublesome 17th and 18th sealed the deal on a rare birdie-free round of 81, eight shots back of the lead set by 2017 champion Skip Pierce.
Matthias got back on his horse in the second round, using three birdies and two bogeys to stroll into the clubhouse with a round of one-under 71. But Boise-native Joel Hickman did the same, posting 71 to follow an opening round of 75 and take firm control of the golf tournament through 36 holes.
Paired with Hickman in the final round, Matthias sat six shots back of the lead on the first tee. But after just one hole, the deficient was down to three after Hickman opened with a triple-bogey. With a birdie on second for Matthias, he found himself one back after Hickman made bogey. By the time they turned onto the back nine, Matthias held onto a two-shot lead and never let it go. He’d go on to win by four.
“It’s very gratifying,” Matthias said. “It was a pretty rough start the first day, but after that I just put my head down and went one shot at a time. It’s an old cliche, but that’s the way you’ve got to do it. Just a little bit at a time...
“I’m pretty pleased with how I finished.”
WOMEN’S SENIOR
The Women’s Senior field arrived at Jug Mountain Ranch on Wednesday morning without a clear favorite on the leaderboard for the first time in a long time. With Karen Darrington out of the picture, there was a clear opening for a new name to find its way onto the Karen Darrington Cup with just two former champions in the field — Shawna Ianson and Sheryl Scott.
Jennifer Harper established her campaign for her first IGA Championship title early on, riding a bogey-free 33 on the back nine into the clubhouse for a one-over par 73 and a one-shot lead. In close pursuit, Kris Fenwick made five birdies in her opening round, but stumbled on 17, making double bogey to take the luster off birdies at 16 and 18.
Stacey Camara and 2021 Champion Sheryl Scott — who battled in the final match at the 2024 Senior Women’s Match Play — rounded out the top four with rounds of 77.
Harper stumbled in the second round, beginning and ending her back nine with runs of bogey-bogey-double and signed for 83. Fenwick found some steady play early on Friday, making birdie at the 2nd and 4th, but a double bogey at the ninth moved her over par. Then the 17th reared its ugly head once again, as the creek swallowed Fenwick’s approach and dished out double bogey for a second day in a row. But it was Camara who found herself floating to the top of the leaderboard, finishing bogey-par-bogey to lead by one.
Just one shot back to begin the day, Kris Fenwick moved back into the lead after nine holes and moved two up through over Stacey Camara after the 10th. Mean while, Jennifer Harper had moved along steadily on the front nine, matching Fenwick with 39. Then as Fenwick and Camara began bleeding strokes on the back nine, Harper’s steady play continued, and she found herself floating toward the lead.
On the par-5 16th, Fenwick four-putt for double bogey and found the water with her approach on the 17th for a third consecutive double bogey on the hole. As the final pairing stood on the 18th tee, Fenwick was one back of Camara and Harper who shared the lead at 17-over par.
All three pushed their tee shots up near the front of the 18th green and Fenwick stuffed one into just inside 10 feet for birdie. Harper then sent one by the difficult hole location and down the back of the green. Camara tentatively left herself a long putt below the hole.
With Fenwick’s miss, and Camara’s three-putt, Harper found herself with 6 feet for par and the win. She poured it in the middle.
“I’m feeling butterfly-ie on the inside, a little nervous, disbelief, happy,” Harper said. “Last year when you guys hosted the State Am, and all the high school kids and college kids were out and it was set up quite difficult, I was hoping to break 90 every day. So, I was looking forward to the forward tees today.
“It means a lot [to win].”
SENIOR MEN’S
Crane Creek’s John Drescher came out of the gates firing with an opening round of 68 (-4) to take a three-stroke lead on Wednesday. In the group behind him, Darren Kuhn and Gary Sherrell were the only other players to break par, one stroke ahead of Brian Swenson who opened with a round of 72.
Through the second round, Drescher struggled early, making consecutive double bogeys on the 5th and 6th, and limped home with a round of 75 to fall back to one-under par. And as Kuhn played a smooth round of even par, making two birdies and two bogeys, Brian Swenson stormed through the front nine with an eagle and two birdies to go out in 32. He would reach five-under on the day with a birdie at the 13th.
But as after a poor tee shot on the 17th, Swenson was forced to lay up to just outside 100 yards for his third. With a back hole location, Swenson flagged it, landing his ball just a couple paces long of the hole and received an inexplicably long, hard bounce over the green and into the hazard long of the green. He would walk away with a quadruple bogey 8 and fell to one-under par for the tournament.
In the final round, Dean Park — who began the day two back of the lead — made a late charge but stumbled coming home on the 18th hole to post two-over for the tournament. And as John Drecsher struggled in the final pairing with Darren Kuhn and Brian Swenson, the latter two had the tournament focused on themselves.
Kuhn made bogey at 15 and handed Swenson a one-shot lead with three to play. Swenson then birdies the 16th to take a two-shot advantage as he turned toward the hole that derailed him the day before.
Both Kuhn and Swenson trickled their tee shots into the hazard long through the fairway, but both were able to get a club on the ball. Swenson elected to chip his down the fairway, and Kuhn chose to go for the green.
“I’ve I wasn’t two-back,” Kuhn said. “I probably would have laid up.”
His second from the hazard came out well right of the green and took a long hard hop further to the right, leaving himself a difficult up and down. But Swenson, meanwhile, dumped his third into the bunker short of the green. Kuhn hit a quality pitch shot to 15 feet above the hole, and Swenson scared the hole with his bunker shot, but it released out to less than a foot beyond Kuhn’s mark, forcing him to putt first.
Swenson missed, and with the help of his read, Kuhn buried the putt for par — moving them to 18 in a tie for the lead.
After trading pars on the 18th, Swenson and Kuhn moved into a playoff, both finishing with rounds of 73 in a tie at even par for the week. They would trade pars again on the first playoff hole (hole No. 1 at Jug Mountain), and moved to the par-5 second.
Kuhn hit an ideal tee shot up the middle of the fairway, while Swenson tugged one into the left rough. Still within striking distance, Swenson fired at the green, missing short right in the rough. Kuhn hit a beautiful shot falling just beyond the bunker short left of the green.
But when Kuhn arrived at the green, he was stunned to see the gallery searching for his ball behind the green. Once found, he had a difficult chip to a front left hole location. Swenson caught his chip a little bit thin, sending it a good 20 feet by the hole, and Kuhn misread his, leaving it a good 12 feet right of the hole.
But much like the 17th, Kuhn used the information from Swenson’s putt to pour his in the center.
“I’m a little overwhelmed,” Kuhn said. “It was a tough day — a tough three days. The golf course was pretty tough, you always have to be on guard. I’m just grateful to have it work out the way it did.”
After six runner-up finishes in IGA Championships, Darren Kuhn collected his first last week.
“It get’s frustrating I think because you want it so much and then it gets so far away when it gets down to it,” he said. “Today I just tried to stay calm and in the moment even when it wasn’t going well…. It’s always more up here [pointing at his head] than it is anywhere else.”
