United States Golf Association (USGA) events are the pinnacle of amateur golf. They’re the most prestigious championships played on some of the best venues in the world.
Imagine you’re on the brink of qualifying for one of the USGA championships, but you need to win a head-to-head playoff and you look up to see your opponent has quarterbacked a team to a Super Bowl.
Imagine you make it to a championship and you grind away for 36 holes of stroke play and find out you’re tied with 13 other people for the last five spots. And one of those players is a member of the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame, a national champion QB in college.
Former Northeast Louisiana (ULM) and NFL star Stan Humphries was that guy in the way, in both instances. And no, even though it was a different sport, he handled the pressure like a man who’s been to the precipice of competitive heat.
Monday, Humphries’ first trip to a USGA event came to an end in the Round of 64 at the U.S. Senior Amateur Championship held at The Kittansett Club in Marion, Mass., but his journey was pretty dang impressive.
In July, the 57-year-old Humphries – a Shreveport native, Southwood High great and these days, the girls athletic director and girls basketball coach at Ouachita Christian Academy in Monroe – was part of a 27-man field looking for a spot (yes, just one) in the U.S. Senior Am.
To have the chance to get to Massachusetts, trailing John Fisher (of Opelika, Ala.) by one stroke with one hole remaining, Humphries birdied No. 18 at Squire Creek Country Club in Choudrant to force extra holes.
Humphries then made a birdie on the first playoff hole to earn his first ticket to the pinnacle of golf for ams over 50.
It looked like it would be a short trip along the Atlantic after Humphries posted a 79 in the first round of medal play at The Kittansett Club. However, a closing 74 earned him a spot in that mammoth playoff.
Humphries, who made several appearances in the annual Lake Tahoe summer celebrity event when he was younger, prevailed again. The playoff took more than two hours to complete.
Nerves. Of. Steel.
The Lady Eagles hoopsters have certainly provided the thrill of competition from a team/coaching aspect (Humphries, whose true sports passion is basketball, guided OCS to a state championship in 2021), but there’s nothing like being in control.
“I get tired of playing at home when a guy goes over to your 5-footer and knocks it back and says, ‘That’s good,’ and I say ‘No, it isn’t,’” said Humphries, owner of a Super Bowl ring as a member of the Washington Redskins and, starter/ringleader of the San Diego Chargers, who won the 1994 AFC championship to reach Super Bowl XXIX.
Humphries was ultimately eliminated in the first round of match play, but not before he halved every hole on the front nine against the No.-2 seed and 2018 U.S. Senior Amateur champion, Jeff Wilson.
“When you retire from football, after having played in front of 100,000 fans, there’s nothing that can fulfill that adrenaline rush anymore,” Humphries told the USGA. “Golf is one thing that, when you get out there, it’s out of your comfort zone. Here I am, 57 years old, and I just love it because you get back into the arena and you compete a little bit.”
Look for Humphries to take another step with his golf game in 2023 as the winner of the U.S. Senior Amateur earns an exemption into the U.S. Senior Open.
It’s safe to say the appetite for winning is whet.
“I’m excited to be up here and be a part of it,” Humphries said. “It makes you want to keep fighting and makes you hungry to do it again.”
Contact Roy at roylangiii@yahoo.com
