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Farmington • Just enough people surrounded Oakridge Country Club's 18th green to deliver the news of his Utah Championship victory to Brice Garnett.
Preparing for a possible playoff Sunday evening, Garnett heard the response to Rob Oppenheim's tying birdie attempt as he stood on the nearby driving range. "From the sound of it," Garnett said later, "it was pretty close."
That's fair to say. Chipping from behind the green, Oppenheim watched his ball catch a lot of the hole and spin away. He flipped his wedge and just smiled good-naturedly. "Gave it a chance," he said.
When he wobbled in the middle of the round, Oppenheim let a bunch of people into the tournament and Garnett emerged. He claimed the $126,000 check for his first Web.com Tour victory, clinching a return to the PGA Tour with a 21-under-par total that nobody figured would be sufficient — including the champion himself.
Such a winning total sure seemed impossible as of Friday, when the leader (Kyle Wilshire) stood 16 under, or even midway through the final round, when Oppenheim was 22 under. In the end, even after allowing two 61s during the week, Oakridge proved to be a decent test and provided a dramatic finish in the first year of the club's three-year agreement as host.
Garnett started the day three strokes behind and closed with a 6-under 65, two strokes higher than his target number to have any reasonable hope of winning — or so he thought. Thanks to birdies on Nos. 15 and 16 that followed a bogey on No. 14, he caught and passed everybody. He finished one shot ahead of Oppenheim, Abraham Ancer and Austin Cook, and he understood how it happened.
"It's hard to close out tournaments on this tour; there's so much at stake," said Garnett, 33, a former Missouri Western State golfer and a close friend of former Web.com Tour player B.J. Staten of Cottonwood Heights.
Garnett's girlfriend was home in Georgia, so the shouting heard around Oakridge came from Staten's wife, Alisha. The Statens housed Garnett during the week, and they all celebrated a victory that seemed unlikely when Oppenheim moved to 4 under for the day and 22 under for the tournament through seven holes.
When he holed an iron shot from 139 yards for an eagle on No. 1 (No. 10 for club members), Oppenheim figured, "Maybe this is a special day."
That theory almost proved true four hours later, but he just missed in his bid to force a playoff. His downfall came via a three-putt bogey from the fringe on No. 9 and a messy double bogey on the par-3 No. 11. He missed the green to the right with an 8-iron, pitched his ball across the green and into a bunker, blasted out and two-putted.
He recovered only partially, with a birdie on No. 14. An errant drive kept him from birdieing the easy par-5 No. 15, just as Garnett was posting his score. "This tour is so difficult," Oppenheim said. "When you've got a chance to win, you want to be able to pull it off."
Oppenheim earned $52,267 — basically doubling his season earnings and moving to No. 30 on the money list. The top 25 players in the regular season will earn PGA Tour cards for the 2017-18 schedule, beginning in October. Garnett is No. 12 and comfortably inside the top-25 projections, so he'll return to the PGA Tour. The first time he got there, he did so without a Web.com Tour victory, making Sunday's achievement even more meaningful.
"I worked my butt off for two years," Garnett said, "and to be going back is really, really special."
Twitter: @tribkurt —
Sunday's scores
Web.com – Utah Championship
At Oakridge Country Club
Farmington, Utah
Purse: $700,000
Yardage: 7,045; Par 71
Final
Brice Garnett, $126,000 64-65-69-65 — 263
Abraham Ancer, $52,267 67-63-71-63 — 264
Austin Cook, $52,267 67-69-63-65 — 264
Rob Oppenheim, $52,267 66-63-66-69 — 264
Blake Adams, $23,730 68-64-67-66 — 265
Jacques Blaauw, $23,730 66-68-61-70 — 265
Nate Lashley, $23,730 67-68-65-65 — 265
Denny McCarthy, $23,730 69-63-64-69 — 265
Ben Silverman, $23,730 66-67-65-67 — 265
Jon Curran, $17,500 68-68-64-66 — 266
Jeff Gove, $17,500 68-67-66-65 — 266
Andrew Landry, $17,500 68-65-64-69 — 266
Matt Atkins, $12,367 62-73-65-67 — 267
John Chin, $12,367 68-65-67-67 — 267
Tom Lovelady, $12,367 65-68-67-67 — 267
Wes Roach, $12,367 64-70-66-67 — 267
Christian Brand, $12,367 67-61-70-69 — 267
Adam Schenk, $12,367 65-67-66-69 — 267
Mark Anguiano, $7,191 68-65-66-69 — 268
Michael Arnaud, $7,191 67-68-65-68 — 268
Vince Covello, $7,191 66-69-66-67 — 268
Jimmy Gunn, $7,191 69-65-68-66 — 268
Bo Hoag, $7,191 67-68-65-68 — 268
Michael Johnson, $7,191 69-66-64-69 — 268
Adam Long, $7,191 67-65-67-69 — 268
Taylor Moore, $7,191 66-63-72-67 — 268
Sepp Straka, $7,191 67-68-70-63 — 268
Dan Woltman, $7,191 68-66-71-63 — 268
Anders Albertson, $3,936 67-68-67-67 — 269
Samuel Del Val, $3,936 67-65-71-66 — 269
Andrew Putnam, $3,936 69-66-70-64 — 269
Alexandre Rocha, $3,936 69-66-67-67 — 269
Blake D. Trimble, $3,936 69-66-68-66 — 269
Roberto Diaz, $3,936 66-68-67-68 — 269
Tyler Duncan, $3,936 63-66-71-69 — 269
Luke Guthrie, $3,936 67-65-67-70 — 269
Brandon Harkins, $3,936 66-70-64-69 — 269
Beau Hossler, $3,936 68-68-65-68 — 269
Billy Kennerly, $3,936 66-66-68-69 — 269
Jim Knous, $3,936 67-65-69-68 — 269
Sam Ryder, $3,936 67-65-69-68 — 269
Greg Eason, $2,326 69-63-72-66 — 270
Michael Gellerman, $2,326 65-68-69-68 — 270
D.H. Lee, $2,326 66-67-71-66 — 270
Michael Letzig, $2,326 69-67-69-65 — 270
Carlos Ortiz, $2,326 68-67-68-67 — 270
Jason Gore, $2,326 67-67-67-69 — 270
Mark Hensby, $2,326 67-68-65-70 — 270
Ben Taylor, $2,326 67-69-66-68 — 270
Kyle Wilshire, $2,326 64-62-74-70 — 270
Scott Gutschewski, $1,931 67-69-68-67 — 271
Jeremy Paul, $1,931 68-68-69-66 — 271
Brian Davis, $1,931 66-69-69-67 — 271
James Driscoll, $1,931 62-68-72-69 — 271
Peter Lonard, $1,931 70-65-65-71 — 271
Roger Sloan, $1,931 67-69-66-69 — 271
Erik Barnes, $1,848 70-64-68-70 — 272
Tommy Gainey, $1,848 67-68-66-71 — 272
David Skinns, $1,848 65-70-67-70 — 272
Zecheng Dou, $1,785 66-67-69-71 — 273
Max Rottluff, $1,785 68-68-67-70 — 273
Charlie Saxon, $1,785 70-64-71-68 — 273
Nicholas Thompson, $1,785 65-71-62-75 — 273
Greg Yates, $1,785 72-64-65-72 — 273
Andrew Yun, $1,785 67-68-68-70 — 273
Zack Fischer, $1,729 67-69-65-73 — 274
Byron Smith, $1,729 66-68-70-70 — 274
Corey Conners, $1,687 66-70-70-69 — 275
Matt Harmon, $1,687 66-68-74-67 — 275
Chris Naegel, $1,687 70-66-71-68 — 275
Dawie van der Walt, $1,687 68-68-65-74 — 275
Ben J. Campbell, $1,645 70-66-67-73 — 276
Kurt Kitayama, $1,645 69-65-72-70 — 276
Lanto Griffin, $1,610 66-65-74-72 — 277
Scott Harrington, $1,610 66-70-70-71 — 277
Aaron Wise, $1,610 70-66-70-71 — 277
Max Marsico, $1,582 66-69-76-68 — 279