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Greatest season ever
NCAA crown, Jack Nicklaus Award cap unprecedented college year for Matt Hill
Past WINNERS OF THE JACK NICKLAUS AWARD, GIVEN ANNUALLY TO THE top U.S. college golfers since 1988, have included such names as Phil Mickelson, Tiger Woods, Hunter Mahan, Robert Gamez, David Duval, Justin Leonard, Stewart Cink, Charles Howell III and a few other PGA Tour
winners. But none of them ever had a year like Matt Hill.
A native of Mike Weir’s hometown of Bright’s Grove, Ont., and a resident of Forest, near the shores of Lake Huron, Hill capped off the greatest NCAA season of all time June 7 when he was presented with the Nicklaus honour before the final round of The Memorial, the PGA Tour event hosted each spring by Nicklaus at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio.
It was an easy call for NCAA officials. When the Team Canada member and North Carolina State sophomore posted a two-stroke victory at the NCAA Championship at the Inverness Country Club in Toledo, Ohio in late May, it marked his eighth victory of the 2008-09 school year, and his seventh win in his last eight tournaments, including the ACC Championship and the NCAA Central Regional Championship. Hill joined Tiger Woods as the only player to win his conference, regional and national titles in the same year, while also setting a new mark for North Carolina State players, having easily surpassed PGA Tour player Tim Clark’s previously record of five tournament victories.
The second Canadian to ever win the NCAA’s individual title (Abbotsford, B.C.’s James Lepp won it in 2005) and the first Canuck to win the Jack Nicklaus award, Hill finally ran out of gas at U.S. Open qualifying in early June, before posting a seven-over-par effort later that week at the British Amateur, where he finished well back of the cut for the match-play portion of the competition. It was unfortunate timing, with his world amateur ranking having recently been upped to No. 2 (fellow Team Canada member Nick Taylor of Abbotsford, B.C. was bumped to No. 1 on June 15).
Still, the summer will be busy for the 20-year-old with two Nationwide Tour events on tap, the U.S. Amateur, a host of Canadian Tour events and the RBC Canadian Open, for which he received an exemption from the Royal Canadian Golf Association. As NCAA champion, Hill has also earned an exemption into next year’s Memorial, assuming it doesn’t conflict with the NCAA final.
Despite his success against some of the best amateur players in the world, Hill says he intends to return to NC State for his final two years of college to fulfill a promise he made to his parents to get his degree. While many might think about striking while the iron’s hot and turning pro, Hill is comfortable with his decision. “I’m going to keep improving on all of the aspects of my game and hopefully get the chance to compete in a few pro events soon to help continue to excel at my game,” Hill explained. “Golfers have very long careers and finishing school will not hurt my development at all—I can still excel at my game there.”
Knowing that his idol, Mike Weir, stayed in school might also have been a motivating factor. “He’s been pretty much my idol growing up” said Hill, who lived down the street from Weir and played at the same course, Huron Oaks. “I met him when I was about 10 and he had first gotten on tour. I watched him hit balls and do a little clinic. Ever since then, I wanted to do exactly what he’s been doing.”
Hill believes he can compete at Weir’s elite level. “I think one of the biggest things (to this past season) was realizing that we’re probably as good as these guys,” Hill said during the Nicklaus Award ceremonies. “There’s maybe a few areas of our game that need to be a little bit more consistent, but just having the confidence that you can do that—that you can come out here and shoot under par…”
Hill, who admitted to being in a zone throughout the NCAA final, demonstrated that combination of confidence and execution with one of the shots of the tournament at a critical juncture. “I hit a four-iron from a sidehill lie from 225 yards on my 17th hole of the day to four feet and dropped it for eagle,” he recalls. “That gave me a tie for the lead going into the final round. That was probably my best shot from the week and one of the best I have ever hit.”
Perhaps, but Hill has a season-long highlight reel of shots that came pretty close to that one. Commenting on Hill’s record-setting run during the award ceremonies, Nicklaus announced, “That’s a pretty special year for you.”
It was a pretty special year for anyone, actually. And to think Matt Hill still has two more years of learning to go!
Previous Nicklaus Award Winners (Division I)
1988 Bob Estes, University of Texas
1989 Robert Gamez, University of Arizona
1990 Phil Mickelson, Arizona State University
1991 Phil Mickelson, Arizona State University
1992 Phil Mickelson, Arizona State University
1993 David Duval, Georgia Tech
1994 Justin Leonard, University of Texas
Alan Bratton, Oklahoma State University
1995 Stewart Cink, Georgia Tech
1996 Eldrick “Tiger” Woods, Stanford University
1997 Brad Elder, University of Texas
1998 Bryce Molder, Georgia Tech
1999 Luke Donald, Northwestern University
2000 Charles Howell III, Oklahoma State University
2001 Bryce Molder, Georgia Tech
2002 D.J. Trahan, Clemson
2003 Hunter Mahan, Oklahoma State
2004 Bill Haas, Wake Forest
2005 Ryan Moore, UNLV
2006 Pablo Martin, Oklahoma State
2007 Jamie Lovemark, Southern California
2008 Kevin Chappell, UCLA
2009 Matt Hill, NC State
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