California State Amateur: Anthony falls, Hossler rolls

By Jack Persons CARLSBAD, Calif. (June 19, 2014) -- Medalist Jason Anthony was knocked out of the California State Amateur on Thursday at Omni La Costa Resort & Spa, making the tournament anyone’s for the taking. Sidney Wolf took down Anthony 2 & 1, only making two birdies and an eagle to Anthony’s six birdies on the day. The bogeys and doubles piled up for Anthony, however, as Wolf won three of the last four holes of the match to close out his competitor. Anthony jumped out to the early lead in the match, making birdie on the second and third holes to go 2-up, but doubled the fourth and bogeyed the eight to drop back to all square. The match went back and forth until the long par-4 14th hole, which Wolf won with a par to Anthony’s double, squaring the match. The two halved the 15th, but Wolf went par-birdie on 16 and 17 to win both holes and secure the victory. With the top-seeded Anthony ousted, the University of Texas’ Beau Hossler becomes the highest seeded player left in the tournament. The second-seeded Hossler had quite the showing on Thursday to move into quarterfinals. Playing UNLV commit Shintaro Ban, Hossler birdied each of his first five holes, taking a quick 4-up lead that Ban could not come back from. Ban won the 6th, 10th, and 13th holes in the match against Hossler, but his opponent quickly rebounded each time, taking the 8th, 11th, and 14th holes to push the match back to 4-up. Hossler then made birdie on the 15th hole to match Ban’s birdie, giving Hossler the 4 & 3 victory. He ended the day with seven birdies. Hossler will play Lorens Chan of UCLA for a berth in the semifinals on Friday. The other quarterfinalists include Xander Schauffele of San Diego State, who will face Paul Smith of USC; Paul Smith, who will square up against Ryan Knop, a UC Davis commit; and incoming Gonzaga freshman and third-seeded Will Brueckner, who will look to take down Matt Hansen, who recently finished his career at UC Davis and garnered an All-America honorable mention this year from Golfweek. The quarterfinals will be held on Friday morning, with the semifinals set for the afternoon. The 36-hole final is scheduled for Saturday. Results and live scoring can be viewed below.