WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS — With the 103rd West Virginia Amateur title hanging in the balance and a single shot separating them, Noah Mullens and Cam Roam matched shots and pars down the stretch on the Old White Course at The Greenbrier Resort as the tension mounted during Wednesday’s fourth and final round.
Neither could seemingly miss a fairway or green, nor could either get a resulting birdie putt to drop.
So, on the par-5 17th — the 71st hole of the tournament — still clinging to a one-shot cushion, Mullens figured the best way to finally put things away would be to not putt at all.
After laying up with his second shot to 37 yards, Mullens hit a pitch shot that bounced twice, rolled forward and went in for eagle, and in the end two shots was the difference as Mullens finished with a round of 4-under-par 66 and closed out at 5 under for the tournament, winning his first West Virginia Amateur title by two shots over Roam and Davey Jude on Wednesday.
The shot will go down as one of the greatest and most clutch in tournament history and it delivered Mullens, a former Cabell Midland standout and just-graduated Marshall golfer, his first Greenbrier Trophy after years of knocking on the door.
“I saw it go in and everybody just went crazy, it was pretty cool,” Mullens said. “I played really good today. Going into today I just wanted to give myself as many opportunities as I could. Just hit fairways and greens and I came out here [Tuesday] night and worked on putting for about an hour and felt really good. I knew everything was there, I just had to have the right mindset and go out and do it.”
And do it he did.
Though playing in the penultimate group starting the day at 1-under, a shot behind a three-way tie between Ryan Bilby, Roam and Jude, it was there for Mullens from the outset. He missed the first fairway but didn’t miss another, going 13 for 14 — and he missed more fairways than he did greens in regulation, hitting all 18.
He came up a hole short of the first bogey-free round of the week, and at the time his three-putt bogey on the last hole cracked the door open — one he thought his eagle had slammed shut. Behind, Roam birdied 17 and, coupled with Mullens’ only blemish, left Roam needing just a birdie on the last hole to force a playoff.
Roam’s shot into the par-3 18th was a good one but it rolled just off the back of the green and into the first cut, and his 18-foot attempt out of that went begging. Roam three-putted for bogey to fall into the second-place tie with Jude.
For Mullens, it was an anxious few moments as he looked on helplessly from the porch behind the clubhouse.
“That was really agonizing,” Mullens admitted. “I wasn’t nervous all day, even on my shot [into the 18th] I felt really comfortable, and when I got on the green I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is about to happen.’”
Speaking of agonizing, it was another tough end for Roam, who led after 71 holes of the 2019 West Virginia Amateur before double-bogeying the last hole to fall out of a three-man playoff.
This time around, it wasn’t a shot he missed that made the difference but one that Mullens made.
And in the end, despite coming up short, Roam said it’s a much different feeling.
“I had my chances out there but Noah played well, he’s deserving and he’s been playing great golf for a long time,” Roam said. “I’ve only had a handful of times coming down the last nine holes having to play perfect golf to win a big event, and it’s good feeling, knowing what it takes and knowing I have what it takes, so when I get back in the situation I can draw back on good memories. I’ll take a lot of positives from this week.”
Jude seized early control Wednesday as he birdied the first hole to take a one-stroke lead and then got to 4 under on the fourth to take a two-shot advantage on the field. A Mullens birdie at the fifth coupled with a Roam bogey at the sixth put Mullens in sole possession of second place, just one shot back. Bilby meanwhile took double bogeys on the par-4 sixth and par-3 eighth holes to fall out of contention and he eventually settled for a 5-over 75 to finish at plus 3 and in a tie for fifth place with Nick Dent.
Jude stumbled with a bogey at No. 7 with Roam and Mullens each birdieing No. 9. Mullens followed with a birdie on the par-4 10th, giving him the outright lead for good.
A double bogey on 11 and another bogey on 14 proved too much for Jude to overcome and, with Mullens at 4 under and Roam at 3 under, both made par on 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 and 16, setting up Mullens’ heroics on 17.
Mullens is the fourth straight first-time winner of the Amateur and the first to come out of the penultimate final group since Mason Williams won in 2019.
