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Colin Prater makes history at Colorado Match Play Championship
20 Jun 2020
by Brayden Conover of AmateurGolf.com

see also: View results for Colorado Match Play, CommonGround Golf Course, Colin Prater Rankings

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Colin Prater (L) and Ross Macdonald played a rain-soaked final (Colorado G.A. photo)
Colin Prater (L) and Ross Macdonald played a rain-soaked final (Colorado G.A. photo)

Colin Prater made history at the Colorado amateur match play tournament. Twice.

The former University of Colorado Colorado Springs PING First-Team All-American became just the fifth player in state history to win both the Colorado Amateur and the Colorado Match Play championships. Prater also became just the third mid-amateur to win the event since 2000.

Traditionally dominated by collegiates, Prater dominated the event from wire to wire. Qualifying as the No. 1 seed after shooting a 4-under 68 during Monday’s seeding round, Prater won his Round of 64 match 7&5, his Round of 32 match 2&1, his Round of 16 match 3&1, his quarterfinal match 4&3, and his semifinal match 2 up, earning his way to face University of Colorado senior Ross Macdonald in the 36-hole championship match.

Macdonald found himself in the championship match for the second time in three years. Sitting 1 down to Prater through 12 holes, Macdonald fell apart with three bogeys by the time the pair got to the 17th tee. Prater continued to draw blood with a 12-foot dagger for birdie on No. 18 to give himself a 5 up cushion as the duo made their way to the final 18.

With help from Macdonald as well as his own great play, Prater extended his lead from 1 up on the 13th tee to 7 up on the 21st tee.

Macdonald squandered away a 12-under performance on the week as he went 8-over on the final 17 holes of the match en route to an 8&7 loss.

“I was just trying to play catch-up,” Macdonald told the Colorado Golf Association. “Colin didn’t make any mistakes, so it was tough to catch him because his short game was on and he wasn’t hitting it too bad. He definitely deserved that win. He was steady. He was hitting fairways and hitting greens. When he missed a green, he had some great chips and was rolling the putter. I didn’t see him have a three-putt all day.”

Prater, a science teacher and girls high school golf coach by day is well aware of his rare feats.

“No matter what it is, it’s cool to win it. I’m super honored and super lucky to have been able to play forever. It’s kind of goofy that I never won this event when I was still playing in college. I had to wait until I got out of college and had a real full-time job in order to actually win it…This one I might cherish it a little bit more because I did it at 25.”

View results for Colorado Match Play

ABOUT THE Colorado Match Play

The CGA Match Play Championship will be played using the PGA TOUR style match play Pod Play system at gross scoring. This means that any player who qualifies for the championship will be guaranteed at least three (3) matches in the championship at CommonGround Golf Course. After each player is ranked (see below), all players will be distributed into their pod with three (3) other players. This will yield 16 pods of four (4) players. Each player will play all three other players in their pod (see schedule below). The winner of each pod will advance to the Round of 16 and a single elimination knockout round will be played at CommonGround Golf Course. The top 8 players will advance to complete the championship at Colorado Golf Club in a single elimination bracket.

Player Seeding: All 64 players will be ranked 1 – 64. The defending champion will be ranked #1. Exempt players will be ranked next based on their 2020 CGA Player of the Year points standings. The rest of the field of 64 will be made from qualifying players that came from an off-site qualifier. Qualifying players will be ranked in order of their qualifying score at their given site.

Pod Assignments/Seeding: The pods will follow the PGA TOUR style of randomized drawing. Once players have been seeded 1 - 64, players will be drawn at random so that each pod will consist of a player ranked 1 - 16 (Player 1), 17 - 32 (Player 2), 33 - 48 (Player 3) and 49 - 64 (Player 4).

Pod Play Scoring: There will be no extra holes during the pod play portion of matches. Scoring during pod play will be as follows: Match Won – 1 point | Match Tied – ½ point | Match Lost – 0 Points.

Note: If there is a tie for the pod winner, a sudden death playoff will determine the person advancing from that pod.

View Complete Tournament Information

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