Padgett edged out the defending champion Jino Sohn (Honolulu, HI), a senior at Arizona State University, who started the day two shots behind the co-leaders Padgett and Jordan Hahn (Spring Grove, IL) but continued his great play on the Cochise Course to compete for the title.
Sohn shot a final-round 4-under 66 -- his eighth consecutive round in the 60s on the Cochise Course going back to last year -- to get into the playoff. Then, on the first playoff hole, he was a two-putt away from successfully defending his title. But he left his 70-foot eagle putt five feet away, and couldn't convert the winner.
When Padgett got the same opportunity on the next hole, he didn't let it pass. He hit a four-iron from 220 yards to set up his own eagle putt from 70 feet. But he lagged it to tap in range, and when Sohn couldn't make his birdie putt, Padgett was the winner.
Said Padgett afterward, “I thought about laying up, but then I told myself that I didn’t fly here to finish second. I wanted to stay aggressive all day long and thought I needed to shoot 67 today to win the tournament. As it turned out, that was exactly the score I needed, but I came up one short and had to go to the playoff.”
Hahn, a rising senior at the University of Wisconsin, was in the mix all day but came undone when he turned the birdieable par 5 15th into a bogey. In the end, that was the difference as he finished two shots out of a playoff after a 70.
“I had 235 yards to the pin, and hit a five iron just a little skinny,” said Hahn. “It was right on line, but in the end that probably ended my chances, as Jino and Wells were playing awfully well.”
Padgett and Sohn finished the tournament at 12-under 268, with Hahn two shots back at 10 under. University of New Mexico rising senior Sean Carlon (Albuquerque, NM) shot a 65 to finish fourth at 9 under, with a group of three players -- Ryoto Furuya (68), Trevor Werbylo (69), and Tripp Kinney (66) -- tied for fifth at 5 under par.