New U of M Transfer Winter Defeats Stevens to Claim 45th MGA Players' Championship

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  ST. CLOUD, Minn. – With three state victories and two collegiate wins to his credit, Brock Winter can now add a major victory to his list of golf accomplishments, defeating University of Notre Dame golfer Nate Stevens to with the 45th Minnesota Golf Association Players’ Championship Wednesday at St. Cloud Country Club.

Winter needed 19 holes to defeat Danny Anderson early Wednesday, before edging Stevens, 2 and 1, during the championship match for his second state win in as many years.

“At the beginning of the week I knew my game was in a good enough spot to compete in this field,” Winter said following his win Wednesday. “If I stuck to my game plan, which was to play every hole as its own match for me, and have a good mental week, I knew it could be a good week.

“I’m newly transferred to Minnesota, so I’m excited for the future there. I had a great conversation with [Gopher Ben Warian] and felt like I did all the prep work I needed for this week. If it’s our week, great, and if it’s not, we’re on to the next. But it was great to get the job done.”

Winter jumped out to a hot start with three birdies over the first four holes, but managed only a 1-up lead after the fifth.

Carding his second birdie of the round at the par-3 sixth, Stevens sank a 30-footer to tie the match before taking his first lead of the day at the seventh with a par.

Rolling in his birdie putt from inside of 10 feet at the eighth, Winter tied the match before capitalizing on back-to-back bogeys by Stevens at the 11th and 12th to recapture a 2-up lead.

Unwilling to back down, Stevens cut into Winter’s lead by dropping his birdie chance from six feet at the 13th, but it was all the closer he would get as a bogey by Stevens at the 17th gave Winter the victory, 2 and 1.

“I started the week fairly well and tried to stick to the positives of my game—driving and ball-striking,” he said. “I think I missed two greens on the first day, so the ball-striking was there all week. My putter was kind of cold.

“I found something late in the semifinal match with my putting, trusted it and got the job done.”

Winter entered the championship as the tournament’s No. 7 seed Monday and picked up a pair of victories over Colton Buege and Manning Lane on the first day of competition.

Cruising during his Round of 16 match against John Fischer, 5 and 4, Winter would then defeat Boston College golfer Muzzy Donohue during the quarterfinal round, 4 and 3.

Winter birdied the first playoff hole against former St. Cloud State University golfer Anderson to reach the final match against Stevens.

“My mental game is something I’ve really worked on over the past couple of years. I knew it was going to be a hot, humid, and heavy week this week, and some of my competitors were going to get tired down the stretch.

“Tee to green, I didn’t feel great, but I was slapping the ball around and finding fairways and greens.”

Winter, who will begin his senior season for the Gophers this fall, has essentially won at every level he’s played.

He closed out his high school career at Stillwater with a Class AAA individual title in 2019 and earned a victory at the Lyle Cran Shortstop Tournament at Stillwater Country Club the following season, adding a second win at the event in 2022.

Last fall Winter fell to professional Chris Borgen in a playoff at the Minnesota Golf Champions at Minneapolis Golf Club—site of this year’s MGA Amateur Championship.

Over his first four seasons at North Dakota State University, Winter claimed a pair of collegiate victories and was twice named All-Summit League First Team.

During the 2022-23 season, Winter set a school record for career rounds in the 60s.

Wednesday’s result marks another close call for the soon-to-be sophomore for the Irish, notching 13 top-10 finishes at state events over the past five seasons.

“Obviously Brock started really well this afternoon,” Stevens said. “It was back-and-forth, but Brock is playing really well right now. He’s hitting his driver great and hitting his irons great—he always does. I wasn’t able to get away with anything with him.

“I’m happy that I was able to hang in there when I wasn’t hitting it the best—it shows some mental resilience that I’ve built. I did a lot of things well to get me to this point.”

During his freshman season at Notre Dame, Stevens played in 12 events for the Irish and notched five top-25 finishes, including a ninth-place finish at the Johnnie-O at Sea Island, during which he shot a 64 during the second round.

He advanced to the NCAA Division I Bath Regional at Eagle Eye Golf Club in Bath, Mich., shooting 1-over 214 to finish 29th.

Stevens claimed back-to-back Class AAA individual titles his junior and senior seasons at Northfield High School, but in 2020, he finished sixth at the MGA Amateur Championship and eighth at the Minnesota State Open the following week as a 16-year-old.

He closed out the 2020 season with a runner-up finish at the Minnesota Golf Champions, in a field stacked with the best amateur and professional players in the state.