AJGA alum and UCLA golfer Patrick Cantlay of Los Alamitos, Calif., received the Ben Hogan Award on Monday, May 21, at a banquet during the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial, making him the first sophomore to ever receive the award. The prestigious award recognizes the performer over a 12-month period in both college and amateur events. Texas freshman Jordan Spieth and Stanford freshman Patrick Rodgers, both AJGA alumni, were also finalists in contention.
Currently the top-ranked amateur in the world, Cantlay, 20, is the youngest winner since Rickie Fowler, who won the honor as a 19-year-old freshman at Oklahoma State in 2008.
Im just very honored to accept this award and really even just to be around and associated with the presence of Ben Hogan, Cantlay said. Its cool to see the great names on the list of previous winners and hopefully I can do what they are doing.
A finalist for the award in 2011, Cantlay had an impressive year as the low amateur at the Masters and the 2011 U.S. Open. He made the cut in five professional events, was a runner-up at the 2011 U.S. Amateur Championship and a member of the Walker Cup team last summer. In 2012, he has exemptions to play in both the U.S. Open and the Open Championship. His career at UCLA includes a second-place finish at the NCAA Championship in 2011 and 11 top-10 individual finishes, including four victories.
During his AJGA career, Cantlay was a two-time Rolex Junior All-American. He compiled 10 top-10 finishes including a win at the 2008 ClubCorp Mission Hills Desert Junior and finished in the top three twice at the Thunderbird International Junior.
As a Hogan Award recipient, Cantlay earned an exemption into the PGA TOUR 2013 Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial, while UCLA was presented with a $20,000 grant to its mens golf scholarship program.
Previous winners of the Ben Hogan award include AJGA alumni D.J. Trahan (2002), Ricky Barnes (2003), Hunter Mahan (2003), Bill Haas (2004), Ryan Moore (2005), Matt Every (2006), Chris Kirk (2007), Rickie Fowler (2008), Kyle Stanley (2009) and Peter Uihlein (2011).