Voges Upsets Sigel in Round 1 of Amateur Golf Championship

Mitch Voges, a 36-year-old carpet salesman from Simi Valley, had not planned on entering the 86th U.S. Amateur Golf Championship until a business trip brought him to the Southeast.

“I had to be in Dalton, Ga., last week, looked at the schedule and saw it was only 150 miles from here,” Voges said after registering the biggest upset of Thursday’s first round when he eliminated two-time champion Jay Sigel, 1-up on 20 holes.

Voges said he got his entry in just before the deadline and won his spot in the original 282-man field as the low qualifier in Southern California.

He made the match-play field of 64 with a 36-hole score of 148 in the two days of qualifying on Tuesday and Wednesday.

“I’ve never won a major event, but I always play well,” Voges said after losing the first three holes Thursday to Sigel before rallying and closing the match with an eight-foot birdie putt on the 20th hole.

“I played good, as well as I can play,” Voges said.

Voges shared the first-day spotlight with four victorious players from Wake Forest, the 1986 NCAA champions.

Two Wake Forest players will face each other Friday: Len Mattiace, the medalist in stroke play with a 137, against Chris Kite.

Mattiace, of Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., was down three after the first five holes, but came back to beat Rex Kuramoto of Stillwater, Okla., 2-up.

Kite, of Hiddenite, N.C., beat Eric Woods of Corona Del Mar, Calif., 2 and 1.

The other Wake Forest winners were Bill Andrade of Bristol, R.I., and Tim Straub of Orchard Park, N.Y.

Andrade eliminated Rod Huff of Boise, Ida., 3 and 1 and Straub, who was one shot behind Mattiace in medalist play, beat Jeff Teal of Minneapolis, 2 and 1.

“You guys put us in the same bracket,” Andrade told one of the tournament officials, who replied that the scores determined the placement in the brackets.

Mattiace, Kite and Andrade all are in the same bracket, but Straub is in the other.

“You’re trying to win just as hard as they are,” Andrade said of possibly facing a college teammate. “It’s a little different, but this is still the biggest golf tournament that we play.”

Stewart Alexander, the LSU golf coach, also scored a first-round victory, going 19 holes for a 1-up triumph over Michael Podolak of Fargo, N.D.

Voges, who calls himself “a Friday afternoon cart player,” said he avoided a mistake that would have closed the match in Sigel’s favor on the 16th hole, thanks to a reminder from his opponent.

Sigel had asked Voges to respot his ball that was on Sigel’s line for an eight-foot par putt. When Sigel missed, for his only bogey, Voges forgot to respot his ball until he was reminded, and then he made the three-footer to cut the lead to 1-up.

Voges then sank a 50-foot eagle putt on No. 17 to tie the match and both parred Nos. 18 and 1. Then Voges closed the match on the second hole with an eight-foot birdie putt.

“I played well, but sometimes you play well and lose,” said Sigel, winner of the 1979 British Amateur and the 1982 and 1983 U.S. Amateurs. “That’s match play.”