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Baumchen and Tyrell Win 2025 City 2-Man Best Ball/Scramble (by Brent Maycock)

By Brent Maycock

With a handful of past Topeka Golf Association champions in the hunt for the City Two-Man Best Ball/Scramble title on Sunday, a couple new faces stepped up and joined the ranks of city TGA champions.

Tyler Baumchen, who is 20, and Bryan Tyrell, who is 19, fired a final-round 60 on a soggy Lake Shawnee Golf Course on Sunday to pull out a one-shot win for the Two-Man title. Their two-day total of 123 edged out a pair of veteran twosomes as the team of Phil Frost – this year’s City Match and Stroke Play champion – and Jay Summers and the tandem of former TGA city champion Mac McFarland and Jeremiah Nelson each finished at 124.

Baumchen and Tyrell opened with a 63 during Saturday’s best-ball format, matching Frost and Summers. Both, however, trailed the team of Megan Deiter and JB Cunningham, who posted a 62 best-ball score.

But when Deiter and Cunningham slipped to a 66 in Sunday’s scramble format, it opened the door and the top-three teams took advantage. After a 90-minute rain delay to start Sunday’s play, Baumchen and Tyrell got hot early and stayed that way throughout, shooting a 60.

Frost and Summers had a chance to force a playoff for the title, but bogeyed the final hole to finish a stroke back, winning a tiebreaker over McFarland and Nelson, who matched the 60 shot by Baumchen and Tyrell.

Deiter and Cunningham finished fourth with a 128 total, tied with Troy Simoneau and Braden Dimick who had matching 64s.

The low round Sunday came from the team of Adam Head and Drew Judd, who fired a 59 to win the first flight with a two-day total of 125, three shots ahead of Andrew Burdett and Tagan Rodriguez.

Gavin Wilhelm and Turner Depperschmidt won the second flight with a 131, beating Brady Sisk and Jake Bervert in a scorecard playoff. Eddie Shirron and Jack Huey won the third flight with a 134, Matt Kreutzer and Boshner Whitaker won the fourth flight with a 144 and John and Aron Waldo won the fifth flight with a 151.

While Frost came up short of winning his third straight TGA event title of the summer, he did wrap up the Player of the Year honors for 2025.

Phil Frost Wins 2025 Stroke Play

By Brent Maycock

After capturing the first TGA City Match Play title of his career in June, Phil Frost hoped it gave him some momentum “to have a little better showing in the Stroke Play than I have the last couple of years.”

That it did.

Trailing Jeremiah Nelson by two shots going into Monday’s final round at Topeka Country Club – despite posting under-par rounds of 69 and 68 in the opening rounds at Lake Shawnee and Cypress Ridge – Frost was able to put together a 4-over 76 to edge Nelson by one stroke after Nelson shot a 79 in the final round.

“Our group struggled all day,” Frost said. “I was just able to hold on to get the one-shot victory.”

While Monday’s round was a grind for both Frost and Nelson, Frost did get a pretty big pick-me-up early. He already had made up his deficit with Nelson when he parred the first two holes while Nelson made bogey.

Still tied going into No. 7, Frost holed out from 117 yards for an eagle while Nelson made bogey for a three-shot swing that gave Frost some breathing room. He finished the front nine at a 1-over 36 after making double bogey on No. 9, but held a one-shot lead on Nelson, who got back two strokes with a par on No. 9.

Frost restored a two-shot lead with a par on No. 10, but Nelson got it back to one when Frost bogeyed No. 13. Both bogeyed Nos. 14 and 15 but a bogey by Nelson on 16 put Frost back up two, but he gave it right back with a bogey on No. 17.

When both parred 18, Frost had his second straight city title. Frost finished with a 76 for a three-day total of 213, while Nelson carded a 79 and finished at 214.

“The last few years coming back to amateur golf has been frustrating for me because my tournament rounds were not up to par with my fun rounds with the guys. The end of last year going into this year I decided to commit to practicing and working out so I could get the most out of my swing and hopefully that would help the mental part also.”

While both Frost, Nelson and group member Jason Buessing (final-round 77) all struggled to get going, 2024 player of the year Myles Alonzo made a hard charge to get into contention. Starting the day six back of Nelson and four behind Frost, Alonzo closed the gap with a front-nine 35 that included birdies on Nos. 5 and 7.

Down four to Frost through 10, Alonzo trimmed the deficit to one by No. 15. But like Nelson, he made bogey on No. 16 to fall two back and though he parred 17 to get back within one, he couldn’t find a birdie on No. 18 to force a playoff, finishing with a 73 for the round and tied with Nelson for second at 214.

Hayden Beck, Adam Head and Brian Walker each finished tied for fourth with 216s with Head shooting a 71 in the final round and Beck a 72. Walker, who had shot a 68 on Sunday, carded a 74 in the final round.

The low round of Monday came from Tyler Baumchen who shot a 2-under 69 to put him seventh with a 218 total, tied with Blake Buessing and Jason Buessing.

In sweeping the City Match and Stroke Play titles, Frost has positioned himself to be the 2025 Player of the Year.

Phil Frost Wins 2025 Match Play

By Brent Maycock

Since ending a nearly 25-year layoff from competing in Topeka Golf Association events in 2022, Phil Frost had met with moderate success in the handful of tournaments he’d competed in.

But nothing to fully satisfy where he felt his game needed to be.

“Playing in the TGA events the past couple of years, I was disappointed in my performance,” said Frost, who finished tied for 11th in the 2022 Stroke Play Championship and then eighth in last year’s Stroke Play tourney. “I felt going into this year, I was going to do some practicing and try to shoot the scores I used to shoot.”

While he said his game isn’t quite where he wants it to be just yet, it’s good enough to make him a TGA event champion. Playing in the TGA Match Play for the first time in his career, Frost navigated the bracket with relative ease to come away with his first TGA title.

Frost capped his run with a 4&3 win over Patrick Golden in Sunday’s championship match at Cypress Ridge Golf Course, using a surge on the back nine to pull away from Golden, who also was playing in his first Match Play championship match.

“It means that the practice that I’m putting in, I’m seeing some results,” Frost said. “Hopefully, we can continue from there and have a little better showing in the Stroke Play than I have the last couple of years.”

After finishing fifth in the 1997 Stroke Play and then fourth in 1998, Frost began his hiatus from TGA events. He tried his hand at professional golf for three years and then returned to Topeka and served as a teaching instructor at Berkshire Country Club for 20 years.

But after giving up his instructor gig in 2020, Frost began playing in TGA events once again in 2022, starting with his appearance in the Stroke Play. He won the net title in the 40-49 division of the Champions Stroke Play in 2023 and then won the second flight of the Four-Man Best Ball/Shamble and was second in the second flight of the Two-Man Best Ball/Scramble last summer.

He began this year with a fifth-place in the first flight of the Four-Man, teaming with Tim Fry, Peter Doucette and Charlie Cooper for a two-day total of 132.

Frost set the tone for his run in the Match Play by earning the No. 1 seed, shooting a 70 in the June 14 qualifying round at Shawnee Country Club. After getting a first-round bye, he survived what turned out to be his toughest match of the week in second round, pulling out a 1-up win over Norvin Daniel.

From there, however, Frost was all but dominant. He cruised to a 5&4 win over Justin Reamer in the quarterfinals and then took out Hayden Beck 3&1 in the semifinals to set up a finals showdown with Golden, who had made a nice run from his No. 10 seed.

Golden rolled to a 6&4 win over Grant Askew in his first match and then knocked off No. 7 seed Kevin Matayka in the second round. After upsetting No. 2 seed Matt Cooper 3&2 in the quarterfinals, Golden took out No. 3 seed Brian Walker 1-up in the semifinals.

In Sunday’s title match, Frost grabbed an early lead with a birdie on No. 2 and pushed it to a 2-up lead on No. 5 before Golden fought back and got things to all square on No. 8. Frost won No. 9 and then hit his approach on No. 11 to 3 feet for a birdie and then won the back-to-back par 5 Nos. 13 and 14, the latter with a birdie after narrowly missing an eagle putt, to go 4-up.

Matching pars on No. 15 ended the match.

“I came out good the first four holes and then hit a little rut and the game kind of went away,” Frost said. “For some reason, this whole week, the back nine I started swinging better and feeling better in all my matches.”

While Frost said he’s not quite where he wants to be with his game, taking the Match Play title is a step in that direction.

“For fun with the guys, it is; for tournament play it is not,” Frost said of his game. “If this was a stroke play week, I would have struggled. Being that it’s match play and you can scratch a hole and go on to the next one, that was perfect for where I’m at right at the moment.”

Jerry Kruger defeated Kevin Boyle 3 and 2 to win the President's flight.