By Richard Rapp
rrapp@massgolf.org
HAMPDEN, Massachusetts (July 8, 2025) – Standing in the merciful shadow of the GreatHorse clubhouse on a sweltering day, attempting to make sense of the stroke play portion of the Massachusetts Amateur Championship, I got caught up in a collision of expansion and contraction. The expansive being the stunning view from the patio, which unfolded in waves of brilliant fairways, then rolls of dark forest, then two-dimensional looking mountains, tinted blue grey by the hazy twilight sky.
The contraction: a full field of 144 narrowing down, shaping up, zeroing in on the requisite 32 match play seeds. You can see nearly the entire golf course from that vantage point, and you could somehow sense a newly heightened urgency from the far-off dots of golfers as they grinded it out, hoping to limbo under a wavering cutline. Expansion and contraction meant something had to break.
The golf course was stern, particularly as the greens firmed up throughout the day, and just six players finished the two days of stroke play in red figures. It wasn’t much of a grind for Matthew Johnson (Charter Oak Country Club), who fired back-to-back 68s to nab the Harry B. McCracken, Jr. Medal by four shots. After a 4-under opening round, Johnson was eager to get off to a strong start to keep the momentum going, and he did just that with birdies on 1 and 2.
“I obviously played well yesterday. You’re definitely thinking about trying to just keep it going,” said Johnson. “Hit a good drive on one, right down in front of the green, and then definitely got settled in after the chip shot. Hit like a really good little spinner up to a couple of feet for an easy birdie.”
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The dwindling hours of day two generally promise intrigue, due to the all-but-inevitable playoff for the final few seeds. In this case, it was a 10 for 8 affair, to be played out in groups of 5 beginning on the 1st tee. As a mass of stand bags and nervous energy overwhelmed the box, thunder rumbled ominously. Here comes that break.
The first group off, featuring the likes of 2024 runner-up Ricky Stimets (Barnstable Golf) and GreatHorse Owner and President Guy Antonacci, unleashed a tight dispersion of blasts down the steep, tiered fairway, all the way to the front edge of the green. Playing first, Antonacci clipped a class chip that skipped up the steep slope fronting a difficult pin location and settled just a few feet from the cup. He would tap in for birdie, earning an impressive bid into match play, and a gleeful outburst from his home club supporters.
The rest of the group chose flat stick, and none of them managed a two putt, heading to the 15th tee to await their fate as group two played down 1. However, just as the next wave of match play hopefuls arrived at their second shots, play was waved dead on account of lightning in the area. The skies darkened by storm and by nightfall. The battle royale will commence on Wednesday morning.
John Broderick (Dedham Country & Polo Club) put together the best round of the morning with a 3-under 69. He entered the day 1-over and bogeyed the 11th, his second hole of the day, but played excellent golf from there on in. He didn’t make another bogey and tallied four birdies, capped with a wedge to five feet on the par-5 8th. “This course is pretty tough. You have to hit really good shots. It’s a new golf course, you have to hit driver most holes,” said Broderick. “It feels good to hit it a lot better these last two rounds, I feel like I’ve been struggling a little bit with it. It just feels nice to start hitting more fairways and greens and play two really good rounds of golf.”
This will be Broderick’s fourth consecutive trip to match play. Given his past success, it’s no surprise that Broderick is looking forward to phase two of the Mass Am: “The next few hours you’re seeing who you might play against. I love it, personally. There’s nothing more fun than the Mass Am or any other match play event. But it’s tough, you’ve got to beat five guys in a row to win this tournament. It’s a challenge, but it’s gonna be super exciting too.”
Broderick is joined by his fellow Vanderbilt Commodore Ryan Downes (GreatHorse). Downes, the 2023 Mass Am Champion and a member at GreatHorse, was one of the heavy favorites entering the week. An opening round 77 seemed out of the blue, but the counterweight to home course knowledge can be home course pressing. With a sizable gallery of family and friends in tow, Downes bounced back with an extremely steady, bogey-free 2-under 70.
There is not a player in the field who can equal the match play bonafides of Matt Parziale (Thorny Lea Golf Club). The 2017 U.S. Mid-Amateur and Massachusetts Amateur Champion staked his place in the bracket (for a staggering 13th straight year) with solid, if unspectacular, rounds of 72 and 73. For the veteran, the stroke play portion of the tournament was more about refining and conserving. “I haven’t been able to play as much, so we could knock the rust off a little bit earlier in the round. I was away all weekend, so didn’t get much prep in,” said Parziale.
Even par after the first round, the goal was to play good clean golf. A double on the par-5 2nd was not the start he was looking for, but he righted the ship with birdies on three of the next six holes. A year after battling health issues at Framingham, Parziale is entering match play feeling strong: “I have no complaints. I’m excited for the rest of the week, and feeling better this year versus last year coming into it. I’m at fighting weight now. “
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Matthew Naumec (GreatHorse) is a craftsman. He’s got the power to fly it out there with the college kids, but unlike some of the young bombers, he knows exactly when to throttle it back in deference to the golf course. When he finds himself out of position, he appears completely unbothered, intent on executing the shot at hand, rather than try trying to rectify the prior misfire. To watch the defending champion plot his way around a course that he knows well amounts to a graduate seminar in course management.
The thesis? Well, it actually sounds quite simple:
“I think if you’re hitting your driver well, your long irons or 3-wood off the tee, you’re putting yourself in good spots. The green complexes are much different than last year (at Framingham CC). Larger, more kind of just swales,” said Naumec. “So, you can pick where you’re going to land the ball on the green and try not to overcomplicate it. You know, out here, it’s just: drive the ball well, get it on the green and make some putts because the greens are so good.”
That’s exactly what Naumec has managed to do through two days. Steering clear of big numbers and cashing in on birdie opportunities. After five birdies in round one, he notched three more today, perhaps none prettier than a controlled wedge into the short par-3 15th.
“Yeah, 15, I mean it’s such a great short par three. Any time you step on a par-3 at 120 yards, you’re licking your chops. 15 is completely different. So just a good number. It was just a low, flighted 50 degree. Stayed below the hole and I was able to make the putt.”
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Naumec made a few more bogeys than he’d like on Tuesday, but the Wilbraham native is right where he needs to be. Back in the matchplay bracket for a fourth straight year, and back at his parents house early on Tuesday for some R&R: “It’s so nice to stay at my parents house and have a home cooked meal.”
Watch: Five Big Things From Round 2
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A few weeks ago we caught up with Guy Antonacci, Owner and President of GreatHorse, to discuss the club’s past, present and future.
Why a golf club?
It’s a long question. So we had been looking for a long time back in the early 2000s. I grew up playing golf at Elmcrest Country Club just down the street in East Longmeadow, had made a couple attempts, to purchase that, didn’t happen. We kind of gave up on the idea for a while.
I went to college at the University of Tampa. At that time, a couple other golf courses had come up for sale. And, you know, there in the area, and they’re good golf courses, but nothing that I was, like, super interested in, pursuing or running in the future. After college, I turned pro for a year and, quickly realized I was not good enough.
So, came back here, started working for the other family businesses, and then, Dave Rafferty, the current superintendent, was the superintendent at Hampden Country Club, and he called me up and said, hey, I think you should come take a look at this place. And, I went to school just down the street over in Munson. So I drove past here, you know, every day from seventh grade through senior year and, had played it a handful times throughout that time. But, came up here, my dad, as I always say, is a big view guy and, took one step on the patio and looked out and he’s like, yeah, we can work with this.
So that’s kind of how it started. And then obviously lots of changes along the way.
Speaking of those changes, what did it look like when you got here and how did you have the vision or how did you come to, decide on what this is?
I mean, it’s so hard to describe to anyone that’s not been here. Lots and lots of trees. We’ve probably cut down 25, 30,000 trees on the entire property. Not just the golf course, but the entire 232 acres. And, we set out, we hired a golf course construction company first, which is a little unorthodox, but, we hired them first. And from there we went out and hired Brian Silva.
The initial plans were just to do a drainage project, a bunch of drainage all over, and a bunker renovation and that started for three months. We signed up 39 members at that time. And, it quickly just evolved into, well, greens are 50 years old. Let’s re-grass those.
And then as I walk through the tee boxes aren’t flat. So we need to redo all the tee boxes. And so now it was tee box bunkers and green re-grassing and at that point we were like, well the greens are 50 years old. Like why are we just re-grassing these things, like let’s build a all new complex.
And so we stripped off all that grass and moved those to the new tee boxes that we built. And, around June 15th, we made the decision that we were just going to close the entire place down for good. So we handed all the members their money back, told them they could play until July 4th of 2012.
And, from there on, we were closed permanently.
So then you worked with Brian Silva. What was that process like? He’s one of the most well known, living architects.
Yeah, working with Brian was fantastic. I mean, you know, to be 24 to start the project and know a little bit about golf course architecture, but obviously nothing compared to what he knows.
At first I wanted flat bottom bunkers and grass slopes, and then he started to educate me a little bit on how all the old golf courses were really built in, that they were rugged and, you know, all sorts of shapes. And they weren’t flat bottoms 120 years ago. And, and so he convinced me to change the style of bunkers there.
And, you know, I would go to Brian and it’d be like, hey, Brian, I think we should do this. And he would look at me and say, hey, go back to whatever you were doing. And, and the next day I would go to Brian and say, hey, I think we should do this and be like, you know what? That’s a great idea. Let’s do it. So, being able to work with him every single day on the ground for four years really was an unbelievable experience that, you know, not many people get to actually go through.
So basically from the day that you guys opened the doors, you’ve hosted everything big in the state. You’ve hosted Opens and, New England stuff, all that. But now you’re getting the Mass Am, what does that mean to you? And what does that say to the commitment you and the club have made?
Yeah, I mean, it’s pretty awesome. I think depending on who you talk to, the Am is probably the biggest event the state hosts, you know, that or the Open and to be able to get it ten years in is awesome. We’re just happy that we can give back to golf and to be able to host all these things. And the membership is great with the course being closed for certain days of the week and, you know, to be able to see the younger members come to these events and then actually now playing in these events is pretty special.
Was it an ambition, to be the ones that set a new standard for golf courses in Western Mass?
Yeah. I think it was. And it’s not just Western Mass. It’s nationwide. I think what we’ve been able to create here, the the culture, the lifestyle, I think it’s refreshing for the world of golf. And I think it’s what golf needed to continue to evolve into the next day and age, you know, to be more than just a golf club, to have all the amenities, to have unbelievable food.
We have a sign at the entrance that says: “You’re Now Leaving Western Mass. Welcome to GreatHorse.” And, you know, it’s really just, when you come on property, we want you to just be with the people you’re with. You can be anywhere you want to be. It doesn’t matter if it’s in Western Mass, Eastern Mass. Doesn’t matter if it’s in New York or wherever. It’s just, you’re on the golf course, you’re here to have a good time and make memories with your friends.
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