Luke Coyle and Zach Watterson were junior golf buddies while crossing paths as they trekked across Kentucky to play in elite tournaments.
“He’s in my graduating class of 2023. We ran into each other all the time,” said Coyle, Taylor County High School’s Kentucky Mr. Golf in 2021 and 2022. “I’m at Alabama now. He’s at EKU.”
They crossed paths again at this week’s 84th Northern Kentucky Amateur Championship at Highland Country Club in Fort Thomas. Coyle and Watterson are in a tie atop the leaderboard after two rounds with matching scores of 5-under-par 135.
Coyle, a five-time all-state performer at Taylor County, is a freshman golfer at Alabama. He was the Crimson Tide’s only freshman starting at least three events. Coyle was the Northern Kentucky Amateur first-day leader at 6-under 64 and followed up on Tuesday with 1-over 71.
Watterson, an all-state golfer at Lee County and the school’s all-time leading boys basketball scorer, is a freshman at Eastern Kentucky University. He carded 64 Tuesday after shooting 71 on Monday and shot up the leaderboard, passing 20 players in the standings.
“Ideally, I would not like to be tied but Zach followed up with a better round,” Coyle said. “I feel like I played pretty well. I just need to keep giving myself some good looks at the greens.”
Though Watterson rallied, Coyle believes he still has momentum heading into Wednesday’s third and final round at par-70 Highland.
“I had one bad swing and got a 7 on No. 15,” Coyle said of Tuesday’s double-bogey encounter. “I was 2-under on the day and 8-under for the tournament before that but I drove too far left off the tee and missed the fairway.”
Coyle was buoyed by four birdies in the second round. He carded five birdies Monday. He’s empowered by his own talent. Many golfers are playing conservatively on the short but challenging 6,190-yard course and attacking when opportunity strikes. Not Coyle.
“It isn’t a bad idea but if you have the length and can control it, let it rip,” Coyle said. “Laying back can put you in a worse spot.”
Watterson, a two-time Kentucky Junior PGA Championship medalist, holed a pair of eagle-2 results on Nos. 8 and 15 to go with four birdies. He made up five shots alone on Coyle on No. 15 to rocket-fuel his rally to the top.
Watterson and EKU golf coach Justin Tereshko put up Tuesday’s top rounds with 64. Tereshko, a Transylvania sports hall of famer, entered Wednesday’s final round tied for fifth. It’s a three-way tie at 3-under 137 with former Highlands golfer and current Northern Kentucky University player Luke Muller and defending champion Adam Horn of Wright State. Muller shot 66 Tuesday. Horn shot 71.
“I was attacking when I got the chance,” Horn said.
Tereshko is a legitimate threat to win. At one point last year, he was the hottest golfer in the Commonwealth, becoming the second person to win the Kentucky Open and the Kentucky Amateur Championship in the same summer. He qualified for the 123rd U.S. Amateur with second place at the USGA Qualifier. He is a one-time top-100 world amateur in 2020. He beat Xander Schauffele in a round of 64 match at the 2014 U.S. Amateur. Schauffele won the PGA Championship last week in Louisville.
There are two more imminent threats. Wright State’s Timmy Hollenbeck and University of Kentucky’s Oakley Gee are in a tie for third at 136. That puts seven golfers within two shots of each other at the top of the leaderboard heading into the final round. Just behind them is Andrew Flynn at 139. Brock Rumpke, Nolan Schuermann and former Cooper golfer Rylan Wotherspoon enter the final day tied for ninth at even-par 140.
Thirty players made the final-day cut. They include former Highlands golfers Marty Arnzen (141) and Justin Gabbard (146) and Highland representative Amit Rattan (147). Arnzen is a multiple Highland club champion. Gabbard golfs at Xavier University.
SENIOR MEN
Pete Betzold, 56, won the two-day Northern Kentucky Amateur Senior Men’s championship. The reigning Greater Cincinnati Golf Association co-senior player of the year shot 4-over-par 144 after carding 73 Tuesday. Betzold, from West Chester, Ohio, won by five shots. The win adds to Betzold’s three Miami Valley Golf Association Metropolitan Senior Amateur championships in the last six years.
Paul Peyton and Craig Higgins tied for second in the senior men’s flight at 149. Five-time GCGA senior player of the year Ed Steiber placed fourth at 151. David Foster from Highland Country Club finished fifth at 152. Defending champ Jim Sweeney placed sixth.
WOMEN
University of Dayton golfer Megan Yoder enters the final round leading the Women’s Flight with a two-day score of 154. Barring a complete collapse, she will repeat as Northern Kentucky Amateur women’s champion. Riley Johnson, a former Lebanon High School standout in Ohio, is a distant second at 162. NKU golfer Hailey Coleman and former Notre Dame Academy golfer Natalie Lovell are the only other participants in the flight. Coleman is in third place. Lovell is fourth.
SENIOR WOMEN
Carolyn Mindel won the inaugural Northern Kentucky Amateur Senior Women’s championship. She earned the victory with a score of 161. Deb Fritz finished runner-up at 182 in the four-player flight