Edgewood golfer wins PNGA Men’s Amateur crown

Mitchell Baldridge of Edgewood, Wash. defeated Trevor Yu of Vancouver, B.C. 2-up in the 36-hole final match to win the 117th Pacific Northwest Men’s Amateur Championship, held last month at The Home Course in DuPont, Wash.

In the tight pressure-packed match, Baldridge never trailed. He won the first hole with a par, and was able to go 2-up a couple of times during the day, but Yu continually came back. Yu birdied the long par-4 13th hole in their afternoon round (their 31st hole in the match) to square the match up, but three holes later, the long-hitting Baldridge birdied the par-5 16th (34th hole of the match) to go 1-up.

On their 36th hole, a 452-yard par-4, Yu, needing to win the hole to extend the match, pulled his tee shot left nearly out of bounds. He pitched out, leaving 100 yards to the flag. His third shot still didn’t find the green, and Baldridge easily parred the hole to close out the match.

When asked about how it felt to have his name on the same trophy as Tiger Woods, Baldridge said, “It didn’t hit me until I started looking at the names on the trophy. It’s pretty surreal. I usually don’t get too excited about things, but it’s pretty cool to see that.”

Baldridge, the No. 29 seed in the bracket, just finished his senior year playing for the Pacific Lutheran University men’s golf team, where during his junior year was named the Northwest Conference Player of the Year.