Pat O’Donnell
(USGA Photo)

In the morning quarterfinal matches, Charley Griswold (Bend, Ore.), a day after knocking off medalist Mike Gleason, continued his hot streak by defeating eight-seed Billy Anderson (Eugene, Ore.) 4 and 3. Thirteen-seed Tom Zupan (Portland, Ore.) battled with 21-seed Terry Paresi (Oregon City, Ore.) in a back-and-forth match that went to the 17th hole, where Zupan claimed a 2 and 1 victory.

Two-seed and defending champion Pat O’Donnell (Happy Valley, Ore.) had quite a test with ten-seed Mike Gustafson (Eugene, Ore.) in a match in which neither player was more than 1-up. O’Donnell took a one-up lead into the 18th hole, and the match ended when the two tied the hole giving O’Donnell a one-up victory. Three-seed Randy Mahar (Portland, Ore.), looking for his first Oregon Senior Amateur title, was locked in a dogfight with Brad Carey Sr. (Lake Oswego, Ore.) until winning on the 18th hole, 1-up.

The afternoon semifinals pitted Griswold against Zupan and O’Donnell against Mahar in matches that would decide the pairing for Thursday’s championship match. In the first group off, Zupan jumped out to an early lead and made the turn three-up on Griswold.

Griswold, coming off of 7 and 6, 8 and 6, and 4 and 3 victories in his first three matches came storming back to enter the sixteenth hole just one down. However, Zupan’s steady play allowed him to win the sixteenth hole and close out the match by halving the seventeenth for a 2 and 1 victory.

In the other Senior Men’s semifinal match, it looked as though O’Donnell’s run was over after he entered the back-nine 3-down to Mahar. However, O’Donnell won holes 12, 14, 15, and 17 to square it up and send the match to extra holes. On the nineteenth hole, Mahar put a shot on the green about 20 feet from the hole on the par-four. O’Donnell stuck his shot to about twelve feet to apply some pressure. Mahar lagged his putt to a few feet, opening the door for O’Donnell to end the match with a birdie. O’Donnell missed his birdie putt, and was conceded his par. Mahar needed to make his short putt to extend the match, but with all the pressure riding on the gimme, he missed the putt. The miss meant O’Donnell completed an impressive comeback victory to win 1-up on the 19th hole.

The Men’s Championship match between O’Donnell, who is looking for his third consecutive and fifth overall Oregon Senior Amateur title, and Zupan, who is vying for his first, is slated to start at 8:30 AM tomorrow off of the first tee. The competitors will square off with 18 holes of match play.

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