*By Del Milligan, Lakeland Ledger
*Photo by Scott Wheeler, Lakeland Ledger
LAKE WALES | Jon Veneziano raised both arms high as the winning birdie putt curled into the left side of the cup on the par-3 17th green at Mountain Lake on Monday.
The 25-footer forced Thad Hudgens to make his 18-foot birdie try on a similar line, but it curved away right at the hole to give Veneziano a 2-and-1 victory in the 32nd annual Florida State Mid-Amateur Championship.
"Finally! It went in. I hadn't made a lot of long putts all week," Veneziano said.
"I knew if I just hung it out there on the left it would start breaking, and hopefully I'd have the right line and the right speed," Veneziano said.
Veneziano, a 42-year-old from Mount Dora, won the Florida Mid-Amateur for the second time. He also claimed the silver trophy in 2005.
"I was fighting to get back. And you're not sure you're going to make it, and you're not sure if you're going to win again," said Veneziano, a financial adviser at Merrill Lynch.
Veneziano, a power player who hits a penetrating draw, also secured the Florida State Golf Association Player of the Year award by winning the 18-hole championship golf match, which featured tremendous shot-making by both players in front of a final-round gallery of about 30.
Hudgens, a 41-year-old from Longwood who's in the restaurant business, would have won the Player of the Year points title had he prevailed.
"This was my real good close shot at making Player of the Year, and I just missed it,'' he said. "That was a goal of mine since the middle of the season."
Hudgens had eliminated Veneziano in the quarterfinals of two previous Mid-Ams.
"Thad's beaten me twice in this thing before, so I was like, ‘Am I going to be 0-for-3, or am I finally going to get one against him?'" said Veneziano.
The 10th seed, Veneziano won three holes on the front nine, which he played in 3-under on the demanding par-70 private course with pins tucked tight in the corners of the contoured greens.
"Even though I was 3-down, I knew it was going to be tough to come back, but I still felt like I had a shot," said Hudgens, the 16th seed.
Veneziano looked likely to go 4-up on the par-3 11th hole before Hudgens hit the shot of the tournament. About 40 yards from the pin on the front apron with little chance of getting close, Hudgens lofted a flop shot that struck the bottom of the pin and stopped 18 inches away. Veneziano picked it up and gave it to him, then missed his birdie putt. "I would have been 4-down. You can't even recoup from that," Hudgens said. Veneziano remained 3-up going into the par-4 13th, but his tee shot sailed left.
"I pulled a 3-iron and got in a bunker and plugged it, and that was all she wrote," said Veneziano, who lost the hole with bogey. At 14, Veneziano pushed a 110-yard wedge into the right bunker with the pin tucked front-right — another bogey. Hudgens two-putted for par and trailed by one. "He gave me a couple of holes, which helped, and I hit a really close shot on 15," Hudgens said. "But then he hits it right in there on top of me. I thought that was my opportunity to get it to even. So that was tough."
Both players hit wedges into the punch-bowl green at 15. Hudgens went first, stopping it within 8 inches of the cup, although the hole location was hidden by banking. Veneziano answered to stay 1-up.
"I knew he was pretty tight, because it was the first time the people in the crowd clapped," Veneziano said. "So I knew I had to hit a good shot, and I hit it in there about 2 feet and he gave me the putt (for birdie).
"At that point, I'd given him two holes. That was important," said Veneziano.
Both players made miscues on the par-4 16th. Hudgens boomed a drive that rolled into the right fairway bunker, just 10 feet from the front lip. "The tee shot at 16 was killer. You've got to keep it left there. That killed me, even though we tied the hole (with bogeys)," said Hudgens.
