Litzelfelner advances to second round of match play

Jackson's Jack Litzelfelner continued his age- and size-defying golf Thursday by winning his first-round match at the Missouri Amateur Championship at Blue Hills Country Club in Kansas City, Mo.

The 15-year-old Litzelfelner recently won the individual title at the Class 3 high school tournament as a freshman at Notre Dame Regional High School, and he's now challenging the state's best golfers of all ages -- all 5 foot 3 and 125 pounds of him.

Litzelfelner, the youngest player in the field, opened the match-play portion of the Missouri Amateur with a 1-up victory over collegiate golfer Tyler Gast of Nevada, Mo. Gast just completed his third year of eligibility at Missouri Western State University in St. Joseph, Mo. Among Gast's past accomplishments was a runner-up finish in a 39-player field at the 2012 MIAA Championships.

Litzelfelner dropped the first hole of his match with Gast, who birdied No. 1, but pulled even two holes later with a par on No. 3 and never trailed again. The match was all square after nine holes, but Litzelfelner won the first three holes on the back when Gast went bogey-bogey-double bogey. Gast won Nos. 13 and 15, but Litzelfelner parred the final three holes to close out the match.

Litzelfelner had qualified for match play by finishing tied for 34th place in the two-day, stroke-play portion of the tournament that trimmed the 153-player field to 64 golfers.

He will play Ryan Eckelkamp of Washington, Mo., in a second-round match this morning. Eckelkamp advanced with a 2-and-1 victory over Jeff Johnson of Ballwin, Mo.

In other first-round matches of note, two-time Missouri Amateur champion Ben Godwin of Poplar Bluff, Mo., lost 7-and-6 to Travis Mays of Overland Park, Kan. Carr Vernon, also of Poplar Bluff, advanced with a 2-up victory over Chase Smith of St. Louis.

Third-round matches also will be held today, while the quarterfinals and semifinals will be played Saturday. The tournament concludes with a 36-hole championship match Sunday.