AUGUSTA, Ga. — Sam Bennett, 23-year-old amateur, said he could win the Masters, and why the heck not? He was invited to play in the tournament, and the object of any competition is to win it, right?
And yet some people who heard Bennett say that Friday were a bit taken aback. No amateur has ever won the green jacket, and it has been nine decades since one captured a major championship trophy of any kind. Should a Masters rookie really be saying those things halfway through the tournament?
“I found myself in a situation that now I’ve got a golf tournament that I can go out and win,” Bennett had said.
And surely enough, after firing consecutive 68s to stand in third place at 8-under, four strokes off Brooks Koepka’s lead, Bennett was given a grand opportunity to walk his talk. After the weather-delayed second round was completed Saturday morning, the Texas A&M star was thrown into the final third-round group with a pair of major champions and former world No. 1’s with heavyweight dispositions: Koepka and Jon Rahm.
It was a wet and wild day for all, particularly for Bennett, who qualified for the Masters by winning the U.S. Amateur last summer at Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus. The kid had been asked Friday why he thought he was capable of overtaking Koepka, a four-time major winner.
“Because I know that my good golf is good enough,” he responded.
Bennett was going to need every ounce of his good golf to hang with the big boys, and perhaps the moment hit him harder than he expected. He bogeyed the first hole out of a bunker, and bogeyed the second hole after whistling his drive into the left-side trees, losing valuable ground to Koepka and Rahm, who each birdied No. 2.
Bennett settled down after that, managing four consecutive pars before the relentless rain and flooded greens forced tournament officials to suspend play at 3:15 p.m.
“It was brutal out there,” Bennett said. “I think they honestly could have called it about 45 minutes earlier, but they tried their best.”
The amateur has seen these conditions before, in college golf, where he said “you play through it all.” Still alone in third place at 6-under, seven strokes behind Koepka, Bennett will now face a 30-hole test Sunday like none he ever has encountered. For motivation, he will look at the tattoo on his left arm that carries these final words his father wrote to him before he died two years go of Alzheimer’s:
“Don’t wait to do something.”
Bennett sees it every time he grips a club.
“I thrive on it,” he said. “I use it for some motivation. I know how happy he would be seeing me out here at Augusta National doing what I’m doing.”