Winged Foot Welcomes Carter Cup
ELMSFORD, N.Y. (August 5, 2024) – The MGA Carter Cup serves as a circled date on the calendars of Met Area juniors and though this year it doesn’t take place at typical host Baltusrol Golf Club due to restoration work in progress on its Upper Course, participants will be in for a treat as the invitational returns to Winged Foot Golf Club for the fourth time on August 6.
Related: Pairings | Carter Cup History | Carter Cup Records
The event will take place over both the West (morning round) and East (afternoon round) courses at Winged Foot. The Carter Cup was first played in 2003 and is named in honor of Michael P. Carter, an accomplished junior player at Baltusrol and standout member of the golf team at New Jersey’s Delbarton School who died in a car accident in 2002. Carter had won the junior club championships at both Baltusrol and Winged Foot and at the time of his death played for Penn State.
Even with its 21-year history, the Carter Cup has produced an incredible list of champions, including Morgan Hoffmann (2005), David Pastore (2010) and Cameron Young (2011) within its first 10 years and more recent winners like two-time champion Ethan Ng (2016, ’17) and two-time Long Island Amateur champion Carter Prince (2018).
Related: Past Champions Photo Gallery
The field, 54 players this year, once again contains the region’s top rising stars, who earned entry based on performance in notable Met Area events.
New Champion
With 2023 champion Barnes Blake and other recent winners having aged out of the championship, a new champion is guaranteed to be crowned at Winged Foot.
Past Pedigree
Winged Foot always has a way of producing outstanding champions, and the Carter Cup’s playings at the famed venue are no exception. Morgan Hoffmann, Ethan Ng, and Carter Prince all won Carter Cup titles at Winged Foot.
No Matter the Format…
Last year, Barnes Blake became just the second player to win both the Met Junior and Carter Cup in the same year, joining Pat Fillian. Sixteen-year-old Jack Chung of Greenwich, Conn., has the opportunity this year, having claimed the Met Junior at Sunningdale last month. His game has remained in top form, shown by his run to the semifinals of the 122nd Met Amateur at Somerset Hills last week.
The Career Junior-Carter Cup
In addition to Chung, John Hiller of New York, N.Y., also has the opportunity to join the short list of players who have won both the Met Junior and Carter Cup in their career. In addition to Blake and Fillian, David Pastore and Cameron Young won both titles in their career. Hiller won the Met Junior in 2022.
Boys’-Carter Cup Double
Cameron Wilson is the only player to have won both the MGA/MetLife Boys’ Championship and the Carter Cup in his career. This year’s field has four players who could match Wilson’s feat, as each of the last four Boys’ champions are in the field: Lance Hollingshead of Basking Ridge, N.J. (2021); Arjun Caprihan of Florham Park, N.J. (2022); Ken Fernandes of Chappaqua, N.Y. (2023); and Zach Berger of Remsenburg, N.Y. (2024).
Met Am to Carter Cup
While players traditionally go from the Carter Cup to the Met Amateur, this year’s schedule has the two flipped on the calendar. Overall, seven players are competing in the Carter Cup after competing in the MGA’s oldest event last week at Somerset Hills: Harrison Browne of Westport, Conn.; Chung; Hiller; Tommy Mangan of Harrison, N.Y.; Quinn Reilly of West Islip, N.Y.; Yiwen Wang of Scarsdale, N.Y.; and Ethan Weinberg of Marlboro, N.J.
Junior Player of the Year
The Carter Cup is another marquee event in the season-long race for the MGA Junior Player of the Year Award, Presented by Callaway, which is now in its eighth year. The winner of the Carter Cup will receive 225 points. Met Junior runner-up Liam Pasternak, who had a pair of match play wins in the U.S. Junior Amateur and finished second in the New Jersey Amateur, leads the points list by a narrow margin over Chung. Seven of the top 10 players in the current listing are in the field.
Format
• Invitational championship, based on criteria set by the MGA and MGA Foundation
• One day, 36 holes of stroke play on Winged Foot’s West and East courses.
Coverage
• Hole-by-hole scoring throughout both rounds
• Social media: mga1897 on Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), and Facebook
• Scoring, recaps, photos and videos on mgagolf.org