Three additional players have earned full exemptions into the 123rd U.S. Open Championship, to be contested June 15-18 at The Los Angeles (Calif.) Country Club’s North Course, bringing the number of fully exempt players to 89. Additionally, three alternates from final qualifying were added to complete the 156-player field.
Emiliano Grillo earned an exemption based on the current Official World Golf Ranking®/OWGR.® Grillo, of Argentina, who is No. 43 in the OWGR, is playing in his fifth U.S. Open. The 30-year-old recorded his second PGA Tour victory with a playoff win in the Charles Schwab Challenge on May 28. He has five top-10 finishes in 2022-23. Grillo, a winner on three professional tours, has made the 36-hole cut twice in a U.S. Open, including a tie for 54th in 2016 at Oakmont (Pa.) Country Club.
Pablo Larrazabal, who is No. 52 in the OWGR, is making his second U.S. Open start. The 40-year-old from Spain is one of two players with multiple victories on the DP World Tour this season. In April, he won the Korea Championship and posted his second win one month later in the KLM Open. Larrazabal has nine career wins in Europe, including the 2014 Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship when he held off Rory McIIroy and Phil Mickelson by one stroke.
Adam Schenk, who is No. 54 in the OWGR, is competing in his second U.S. Open. He advanced through the Columbus, Ohio, final qualifier last year and tied for 24th at The Country Club, in Brookline, Mass. Schenk, 31, of Vincennes, Ind., has finished second twice on the PGA Tour this season. He was runner-up to Taylor Moore in the Valspar Championship and lost to Grillo in a playoff at the Charles Schwab Challenge.
The USGA held six spots in the field for those players who could potentially qualify by moving into the top 60 of the OWGR, as of June 12. Since Grillo, Larrazabal and Schenk were the only players to earn an exemption, three alternates from final qualifying were added to the field. They are amateur Bastien Amat, Michael Kim and amateur Maxwell Moldovan.
Amat, 21, of France, will compete in his first U.S. Open after working his way through both stages of qualifying. He was the first alternate from the Lakewood, Wash., final site after carding a 65 in his afternoon round of the 36-hole qualifier. Amat, who recently completed his junior year at the University of New Mexico, was the medalist with 69 on his college course in the Albuquerque, N.M., local qualifier. Amat, who earned All-Mountain West Conference honors for the second straight season, registered five top-10 finishes and won the Wolf Pack Classic.
Michael Kim, 29, of the Republic of Korea, was the first alternate from the Dallas, Texas, final qualifier. He is competing in his second U.S. Open, but has not played since 2013 when he tied for 17th and was low amateur at Merion Golf Club. Kim, who won the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic in 2018, was a member of the winning 2013 USA Walker Cup Team and received the Jack Nicklaus Award as Division I’s top player while competing at the University of California-Berkeley. He was raised in San Diego, Calif., and attended Torrey Pines High School.
Maxwell Moldovan is playing in the U.S. Open for the second consecutive year. The 21-year-old from Uniontown, Ohio, was the first alternate from the Springfield, Ohio qualifier. Moldovan, an All-America and All-Big Ten Conference selection at Ohio State University, won three tournaments – the Nexus Collegiate, Southern Invitational and Robert Kepler Invitational – as a junior in 2022-23. He has competed in six USGA championships, including four U.S. Amateurs.
Romain Langasque, of France, and Simon Forsstrom, of Sweden, gained full exemptions on May 22 as the top two finishers from the 2023 DP World Tour U.S. Open Qualifying Series. The category featured the top two aggregate points earners, who were not otherwise exempt, from the DS Automobiles Italian Open, Soudal Open, KLM Open and Porsche European Open between May 4 and June 4.
The U.S. Open returns to Los Angeles for the first time since 1948, when Ben Hogan won the first of his four U.S. Opens with a 72-hole score of 276 (8 under par), two strokes better than Jimmy Demaret, at The Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades.
There were 109 U.S. Open local qualifying sites that led to 13 final qualifiers, including international sites in Japan, England and Canada. Final qualifying in the United States took place at 10 sites, in the states of California, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio (Columbus & Springfield), Texas and Washington. The USGA accepted 10,187 entries by the deadline of April 12, the highest total in championship history.
