U.S. OPEN
Ranking the Nine U.S. Opens Contested at Oakmont C.C.
The U.S. Open is being contested this week at historic Oakmont Country Club for a record 10th time. The venerable western Pennsylvania venue has produced some memorable championships, with six of the nine previous winners currently residing in the World Golf Hall of Fame now located in the Village of Pinehurst, N.C. That list includes Jack Nicklaus, Ben Hogan, Johnny Miller and Ernie Els.
Here is one writer’s ranking of the nine U.S. Opens at Oakmont in reverse order:
Every day leading up to the championship, local professional Sam Parks Jr. would stop by and play Oakmont. At the time, the 25-year-old was the first-year head professional at South Hills Country Club. The Bellevue, Pa., native had taken his first lesson 13 years earlier from Gene Sarazen, and then captained the golf team at the University of Pittsburgh.
Helped by course familiarity and local support, Parks, who three-putted just twice the entire championship, posted rounds of 77-73-73-76 for a 72-hole total of 11-over-par 299. It was the highest score by a winner since Tommy Armour’s triumph eight years earlier at Oakmont. Parks finished two strokes ahead of Jimmy Thomson and three ahead of Walter Hagen. Parks would cap off his year by representing the U.S. in the Ryder Cup Matches.
That week also witnessed another historic moment. Edward Stimpson Sr., a former Massachusetts Amateur champion who had captained Harvard golf team, devised a device to measure green speeds. He brought the implement to Oakmont and the Stimpmeter was thus born.
With a little more than 150 men and under two dozen mule teams, Henry Fownes constructed Oakmont Country Club in suburban Pittsburgh on old farmland with the hope of creating a championship-caliber golf course. And twenty-four years after the course opened, the USGA brought the U.S. Open Championship to Oakmont. The U.S. Amateur (1919) and PGA Championship (1922) had already been contested at Oakmont, and there was little doubt the layout could challenge the best players of the time.
The 1927 U.S. Open featured a stellar field, including Bob Jones, Gene Sarazen and Walter Hagen. But it was a Scotsman, Tommy Armour, a World War I veteran who had lost sight in his right from a mustard gas explosion, who prevailed. His 301 total was the highest by a champion since 1919. The course yielded just one sub-70 score, Al Espinsoa’s 69 in the final round. Armour, nicknamed The Silver Scott, defeated American Harry Cooper in a playoff by three strokes (76-79). Neither player broke par during the championship.
Minnesota amateur Jimmy Johnston, who would win the U.S. Amateur in 1929 at Pebble Beach, was the surprise 36-hole leader, but a third-round 87 ended his title hopes. Sarazen, Hagen, Bill Mehlhorn and Emmet French were also in contention, but only the latter managed to break 40 on Oakmont’s inward nine in the final round.
Armour managed to drain a 10-foot birdie putt on the 72nd hole to force the playoff, which turned midway through the back nine with Armour converting a birdie on 13 and Cooper suffering a bogey at 15, which tied up the festivities. Cooper then double-bogeyed the par-3 16th to essentially end his hopes.
A year after a heartbreaking three-putt on the 72nd hole at Chambers Bay that cost him a chance to face Jordan Spieth in a Monday playoff, Dustin Johnson got redemption with a three-stroke victory over 2003 champion Jim Furyk, Shane Lowry and upstart Scott Piercy. But this victory didn’t come without some controversy and adversity.
During the final round as Johnson was trying to chase down Lowry, the 54-hole leader, Johnson addressed his ball on the fifth green. The ball moved ever so slightly and while an initial penalty was not handed out, television reviews indicated otherwise. As USGA officials mulled over the decision, Johnson kept playing, not immediately knowing if he would incur a penalty. A few holes later, he was approached that a possible penalty would be given. This wasn’t his first foray with the Rules. In the 2010 PGA Championship, he was deemed to have grounded his club in a bunker on the 72nd hole (he thought it was a waste area because it was so far off the fairway), costing him a shot at the playoff, or even victory in regulation.
But this time, Johnson showed the poise and intestinal fortitude required of winning this prestigious championship by focusing on the golf and not the surrounding white noise. A brilliant approach to the 72nd hole set up a tap-in birdie and, finally, a major title. Six years earlier at Pebble Beach, Johnson entered the final round with the lead, only to shoot an 82.
This time, it was others who faltered. Lowry played the last 10 holes in 4 over par to shoot 76. Furyk’s final-round 66 just wasn’t enough, and neither was Piercy’s Sunday 69. Johnson posted a 69 for a 72-hole total of 4-under 276,
“I just kept telling myself it’s just me and the golf course,” Johnson said. “I’m just playing the golf course today.”
He did that, and more.
When the 156 competitors arrived at Oakmont for the 107th iteration of the U.S. Open, one thing was quite noticeable: the absence of trees. More than 3,000 were removed prior to the championship, bringing the course back to its original look while creating breathtaking vistas from every spot on the layout. Perfect weather also created the idyllic firm and fast conditions the USGA desires for its championships.
In the end, a chain-smoking Argentinian held off past champions Tiger Woods and Jim Furyk for a one-stroke victory. Woods, then seeking a third title to go along with his triumphs in 2000 and 2002 (he’d win again on one leg a year later at Torrey Pines), saw his chances derailed with a disappointing double-bogey 6 on the par-4 third in Sunday’s final round. Both Woods and Furyk, a Pennsylvania native and 2003 champion who grew up a huge Pittsburgh Steelers fan, had chances to force a Monday playoff, but neither managed to birdie the challenging par-4 closing hole.
Meanwhile, the 35-year-old Cabrera would fire one of two sub-par scores on Sunday (Anthony Kim posted a 67) with a 1-under 69 to post 5-over-par 285 to become the first South American to capture the National Open. Countryman Roberto DeVicenzo had won the inaugural U.S. Senior Open in 1980, and Eduardo Romero would claim the same championship a year later.
The 1994 championship is best known for a number of reasons, notably that it was the last U.S. Open for local legend Arnold Palmer. Given a special exemption by the USGA, it was Palmer’s first Open appearance in 11 years (1983 at Oakmont). Palmer carded rounds of 77-81 to miss the cut, but not before rousing ovations by the throng of spectators who came to get one last glimpse of the 1960 champion competing for the 32nd time. His U.S. Open career began as an amateur in 1953 at Oakmont.
Ernie Els, of course, would win the first of two U.S. Opens, this one in a playoff over Colin Montgomerie and Loren Roberts. Els actually needed two extra holes to edge Roberts after both shot 4-over 74s in the Monday playoff (Montgomerie shot 78). A two-putt par for Els on the par-4 11th hole ended the festivities.
Els also got a favorable ruling from future USGA president Trey Holland to begin Sunday’s final round. After an errant drive on the par-4 first hole, Els asked Holland, the Rules official in the final pairing, for a drop due to an aerial camera being in his intended line of play. Granted the favorable drop, Els proceeded to make just a bogey 5 when the result could have been much more disastrous.
Els would shoot a final-round 73 for a 72-hole total of 1-under 279. Montgomerie and Roberts each posted even-par 70s to match the affable South African. Els would add a second U.S. Open title three years later at Congressional Country Club.
The week also was noted for the sultry temperatures, which reached into the triple digits for the playoff on Monday.
Everyone was set to see Tom Watson successfully defend his U.S. Open title from Pebble Beach, especially after the 54-hole leader got off to a sizzling start in Sunday’s final round with a first-nine 31. Then a storm rolled through the area, forcing a non-playoff Monday finish. The delay took away Watson’s momentum and gave new life to his chief chaser, Vietnam veteran Larry Nelson. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Nelson didn’t take to golf until he had been drafted into the U.S. Army, choosing to focus on basketball and baseball as a teen. He was introduced to golf at the age of 21 by Ken Hummel, a soldier and friend in his infantry unit.
He began to study the game through Ben Hogan’s book, "The Five Fundamentals of Golf," and soon discovered he had the talent to play the game at a high level. After graduating from Kennesaw Junior College in 1970, he turned professional the following year and would go on to enjoy a Hall-of-Fame career that included three major titles, including the 1983 U.S. Open.
When play resumed that Monday morning, Nelson birdied No. 14 and then holed a 45-foot birdie putt on the par-3 16th, while Watson faded to a second-nine 38. His final-round 67 was good enough for a 72-hole total of 280 and a one-shot win over Watson. It was his second major title following the 1981 PGA Championship. Nelson would add a second PGA title in 1987.
There was one other notable item from the 1983 championship. Bob Ford, Oakmont’s longtime head professional, became the third host professional to make the 36-hole cut with rounds of 76-73-75-72. Ford, who split his time between Oakmont (summer) and Seminole Golf Club in Florida (winter), has since retired from both jobs, but now serves as the first-tee starter at the U.S. Open, and will be on hand in June to greet the competitors.
The Texan would enjoy one of the greatest seasons in golf, capturing all three major championships he entered, including the U.S. Open at Oakmont. Hogan only competed in six events that year, winning five. It began with a four-stroke victory in April’s Masters Tournament at Augusta National Golf Club. Then at Oakmont, he opened with a course-record 67 and followed with rounds of 72-73-71 for a six-stroke victory over Sam Snead. He would go on to add The Open Championship at Carnoustie in his only appearance in the event. But because The Open (July 6-10) conflicted at the time with that year’s PGA Championship (July 1-7), Hogan chose to play the former and thus couldn’t go for the modern-day Grand Slam.
The feat became known as the Triple Crown of Golf.
Hogan would never win the U.S. Open again, despite losing a playoff to Jack Fleck at The Olympic Club in 1955 and coming up just short of the 1960 championship at Cherry Hills Country Club that was won by Arnold Palmer and his spectacular final-round 65.
It is, arguably, the greatest final round in major-championship history. Johnny Miller entered that last Sunday in 1973 six strokes off the 54-hole lead held by John Schlee, Fred Herd, local favorite Arnold Palmer and Julius Boros, the latter two past U.S. Open champions. In Saturday’s third round, Miller had forgotten his yardage book in his hotel room, and his wife went back to retrieve it. The mishap led to a 76.
Almost an afterthought going into the final round, Miller came out firing with four consecutive birdies, but a three-putt bogey on the difficult par-3 8th momentarily stopped his early momentum. Then Miller heated up again with birdies on four of his next holes, thanks to laser-like precision with his irons. All four of Miller’s birdies on the second nine were no longer than 15 feet, including a 5-footer on the 185-yard 13th hole.
Miller hit all 18 greens in regulation and needed just 29 putts to edge Schlee by a stroke. Schlee had an opportunity to force an 18-hole Monday playoff, only to see his approach fly over the green on the 72nd hole. His 45-foot pitch stopped a foot short of the flagstick. Tom Weiskopf finished third, two strokes back of Miller.
“There will be guys that will shoot lower scores,” Miller told Sports Illustrated in 2023, “but can they do it on Sunday to win the U.S. Open and pass up the kind of guys that I passed up? That's what makes the story or the round honorable. Makes it cool.”
The 1962 U.S. Open came down to the hometown favorite and the “new” kid on the block. Virtually everyone who showed up at Oakmont came to see The King, Arnold Palmer, who grew up down the road at Latrobe, Pa. Arnie’s Army, as his legion of fans came to be known, were out in full force, providing support for their guy while trying to make things difficult for the 22-year-old upstart, Jack Nicklaus, who had captured his second U.S. Amateur title a year earlier at Pebble Beach. Then a rookie on the PGA Tour, Nicklaus also was seeking his first professional victory.
Both finished 72 holes at 283, with Nicklaus shooting rounds of 72-70-72-69, and Palmer posting 71-68-73-71.
Some 10,000 spectators came out for the 18-hole playoff, but it was Nicklaus who stole the early momentum, taking a four-shot lead after six holes. Palmer would rally with birdies on nine, 11 and 12 to trim the deficit to one, but a costly three-putt bogey on the par-3 13th essentially ended his bid for a second U.S. Open title. Palmer registered 11 three-putts over the course of five rounds compared to just one for Nicklaus, who would shoot 71 and win by three strokes.
Nicklaus would go on to win 18 major titles, including three more U.S. Opens. Palmer would contend again for the U.S. Open in 1963 and 1966, only to come up short in playoffs, and also finish second to Nicklaus in 1967 at Baltusrol.
David Shefter is a senior staff writer at the USGA. Email him at dshefter@usga.org.
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