ASGA Match Play Championship

Lee, 61, says he's played his last competitive round

 Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STATON BREIDENTHAL --8/16/14-- Stan Lee watches as his ball rolls past the hole after chipping onto the green Saturday during the ASGA Match Play at The Greens at North Hills in Sherwood.
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/STATON BREIDENTHAL --8/16/14-- Stan Lee watches as his ball rolls past the hole after chipping onto the green Saturday during the ASGA Match Play at The Greens at North Hills in Sherwood.

One of the most significant careers in Arkansas golf came to an apparent end Saturday.

Three hours after losing 7 and 5 to Drew Greenwood in the quarterfinals of the Arkansas State Golf Association Match Play championship at The Greens at North Hills in Sherwood, Stan Lee said from his home in Heber Springs that it was his final round of competitive golf in Arkansas.

"This was my last tournament," Lee said. "There is just so much that goes into it. If I want to be good, if I want to win, I'm going to have to practice at least four or five times a week and I've got to be the best I can be. That's just the way I am."

"Stan has achieved about everything he could have achieved in the world of amateur golf," ASGA executive director Jay Fox said. "He's been a great champion for a long time. He's a gentleman on and off the course."

Lee, 61, was an All-American at LSU and played five seasons on the PGA Tour, but his career reached its pinnacle Sept. 7, 2007, when he won the U.S. Golf Association Senior Amateur Championship with a 4 and 3 victory over Sam Farlow at Flint Hills National Golf Club in Andover, Kan.

It hit a low point Saturday at North Hills. Lee was 7-down as he swung a 3-wood from the par-4, No. 13 tee. His club head struck the top of the ball, which hopped straight ahead 75 yards and failed to reach the fairway. He turned to a handful of people nearby, smiled and said, "Have you ever seen me hit a worse shot?"

He laughed about it later.

"I just cold topped it," Lee said. "I was trying to think if I'd ever done that before. As I was driving home, I remembered doing it in once in college.

"That was the worst I've played this year. I just ran out of gas out there. I just couldn't move my legs."

Greenwood, of Hot Springs, advanced to today's semifinals where he will play Austin Harmon, a quarterfinal winner in 19 holes over Richard Wrentz.

The other half of the quarterfinal draw presented long, grinding matches. Kevin Walker of North Little Rock defeated Nick Zimmerman of Little Rock in 21 holes, and Beau Glover of North Little Rock defeated Chris Jenkins of Little Rock, in 20.

Glover and Jenkins struggled late in their match, with Glover moving to all-square when he bogeyed the 189-yard, par-3 17th to top Jenkins' double.

They remained square through 19 holes, but on the 20th, the 354-yard, par-4 No. 2., they used opposite strategies that ultimately decided the match.

Glover used driver from the tee. His shot landed 30 yards short of the green. Jenkins used a 4-iron that left him 126 yards away.

"The green is so difficult to hit into that I wanted to have something I could hit into the green," Jenkins said. "I tried to hit a really hard gap wedge, and I just hit it low on the face."

His shot went 15 yards long.

Glover also got a poor result from his second shot, which he chunked 20 feet short.

In the end, Glover took three strokes to reach the green in regulation. Jenkins took four, the last of which, from 20 feet, he needed to make to extend the match. His chip missed by a foot to the left.

"That last hour was tough golf," Jenkins said. "This golf course, with the wind starting to blow, is so hard. The greens out here are so diabolical that you never feel safe."

"It was a grind," Glover said.

It was perhaps a final grind for Lee, although he said he plans to play the U.S. Senior Team Challenge in Tulsa in late October with friends Bev Hargraves and Bobby Baker and brother Louis Lee.

In their first match together last season, Stan Lee defeated Greenwood, 20, of Hot Springs, 4 and 3 to win the Match Play Championship. As they walked from the 13th green after their match on Saturday, Greenwood told Lee that he learned so much from playing against him.

"He taught me about patience, respect for the game, and through the way he treated everyone else involved," Greenwood said.

"I don't know of anyone who has ever said a negative word about Stan," Glover said. "He's a first-class person and a first-class golfer."

Sports on 08/17/2014

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