By Tori Schuller
ANDOVER, Massachusetts (September 8, 2025) – Any onlooker stumbling upon the 42nd Massachusetts Mid-Amateur would guess they were in Florida, Southern California, or even Spain. Stucco yellow walls, burnt orange roof tiles, and gas lamps adorn the back deck of the estate, giving you an 180-degree view. However, if such an onlooker found themselves just 1,500 miles north of the Sunshine State and into the Merrimack Valley region of Massachusetts, their location would read “Andover Country Club.”
After being previously slated to host the Mass Mid-Amateur in 2020, Andover is now getting its turn five years later, testing the state’s best players aged 25 and up with a Handicap Index® of 4.0 or lower. The second round gets underway at 7:30 a.m. Tuesday, with the field of 130 players set to be trimmed to the low 30 and ties for Wednesday’s final round.
The low round of morning came from Matthew Johnson (Charter Oak Country Club), firing off five birdies in his last nine holes to close Monday out with a 3-under-par 68. With tight tree lines and sloping greens, Andover is no easy feat to conquer, but Johnson overcame an early stumble and battled his way around well.
“I got off to a bit of a shaky start early, and wasn’t putting great, kind of not rolling it, and then a nice two-putt birdie on seven to get it going, and then kind of just started rolling it from there,” Johnson said. “The putter was really good. Only missed one putt after, like the sixth hole, and just rolled it really well the whole day.”
While Johnson found the better side of the greens, first-time players struggled on them.
“I played up here, like, seven or eight years ago, and then just the practice round, but it was pretty clear where you can and can’t really be aggressive on the putts out here, but I think I was hitting him close, and then just made a lot of 10-12, footers coming in.”
In July, Johnson carded back-to-back 68s at the Massachusetts Amateur, to earn the Harry B. McCracken, Jr. Medal by four shots and is hoping to keep his outstanding play going throughout the next couple days.
“Everything’s just clicking, and it just feels solid,” Johnson said. “It’s never easy, but certain things feel easy at times, and I guess I’m in one of those times right now.”
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Matt Parziale (Thorny Lea Golf Club) is more than booked in the first week of September. With an appearance at the Massachusetts Mid-Amateur through Wednesday, Parziale is hoping on a plane to the Southwest on Wednesday for a little change of scenery as he’ll compete in the 44th U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship, at Troon Country Club in Arizona.
A three-time champion of the Massachusetts Mid-Amateur and winner of the U.S. Mid-Amateur in 2017, Parziale is hoping Monday is the start of memorable, two-week barrage of competitive golf.
“I didn’t remember the greens, just remembered needing to pay attention to them,” Parziale said. “So I just tried to give myself the best spot from the fairway, a little bit of guessing and a little bit of past knowledge.”
With an even-par front nine, Parziale hit his stride on the back. A birdie on 11 brought Parziale back to even par, and he grabbed a birdie on 16 and 17 to close out his round, ending at 2-under-par, and in solo second.
“I got myself into a couple bad spots, but for the most part, pretty happy with it,” Parziale said. “Didn’t really feel like I was firing on all cylinders, but I putted well today, especially down the stretch. I made a nice par point there on the last hole.”
As September arrives in the northeastern part of the U.S., competitive golf starts to wind down, but not for Parziale.
“For me we have these three events to end the year,” Parziale said. “I got this week, the U.S. Mid-Am, and then the Crump Cup [at Pine Valley] at the end of the month, which is my favorite tournament of the year.”
Nick Maccario (GreatHorse) has played in plenty of competitive golf events, but something about Andover Country Club still tugs at the heartstrings.
Back in 2019, he earned his first U.S. Amateur berth right here at Andover, just a short drive down the road from his hometown of Haverhill. He then capped the year by winning the Massachusetts Mid-Amateur title at Brae Burn Country Club. He was set to defend it at Andover the following season, but COVID-19 forced the event to relocate to GreatHorse.
Now living in Georgia and competing regularly in top-tier amateur events across the country, the 2020 Mass Golf Player of the Year made his first Mass Golf appearance in over a year. Wearing a Gasparilla Invitational skull-and-crossbones cap as well as a pink shirt featuring the local Garrison Golf Center with the GreatHorse logo on the sleeve, the Haverhill native called this week’s Mid-Amateur appearance a perfect alignment.
“It worked out with the schedule,” said Maccario, also a 2021 U.S. Mid-Amateur semifinalist. “I can’t play U.S. Mid-Amateur this year, and so I get to knock some rust off and have some stuff later this month. It made sense to get to come up and see family now that we moved. So, it’s all good timing.”
On Monday, he opened with a 1-over 72, but the score hardly tells the story, especially when you consider the events of his final two holes. If nothing else comes out of this week, Maccario will remember his lie on the 17th, when his tee shot landed in thick rough. As he checked the lie for an embedded ball, Maccario instead found something even more abnormal: his ball resting on what looked like a piece of sandwich meat. He wisely left the stray scrap alone and played on, saving par with a two-putt from beyond 40 feet.
“I don’t think any rules official has ever gotten a call that someone’s ball was sitting on old lunch meat,” he said, shaking his head. “But that’s what happened on 17. I didn’t know if we’d get relief, but it still worked out great.”
That wasn’t all. On 18, his drive drifted into the adjacent 1st fairway, even farther left than the neighboring 10th fairway, where several players hit their drives. But from way beyond the tee box, Maccario pulled the same 8-iron he used to clinch his U.S. Amateur berth six years ago, reached the green, to get in the clubhouse without any major damage.
“It was a couple weird things and a couple of lucky breaks,” Maccario said. “There are spots where you can be a little more aggressive. It didn’t totally pay off, but it paid off enough.”
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