Canadian Tour Regular Doeden & CDH Sophomore Honsa Tied for Tapemark Lead

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WEST ST. PAUL -- Justin Doeden is a former University of Minnesota star who has been playing on the PGA Tour LatinoAmerica this spring --- he's No. 33 on that money list with $16,457 in 10 events -- but will start playing on the PGA Canada Tour next week, at the Royal Beach Victoria Open. Joe Honsa is a sophomore at Cretin-Derham High School, and he'll be at Bunker Hills next week to play in the Class AAA portion of the state high school tournament. In the meantime, they are playing in the Tapemark Minnesota PGA Pro -Am, and they're tied for the lead after they both shot 6-under-par 65s on Friday.

One is young, and the other is really young. So they both bomb their drivers -- and all the other clubs in their bag, for that matter, excpt their putters. As an example, Honsa hit a pitching wedge to within a few feet of the hole at the 175-yard, par-3 second hole on Friday. But he missed the birdie putt. Undaunted, he birdied the par-4 third hole and the par-5 fourth. The only par 5 he didn't birdie was the 486-yard sixth, but he made up for that omission by making birdies at the 370-yard, par-4 seventh and the 330-yard, par-4 ninth and concluded his round with a front-nine 32.

The son of an all-state pitcher (Mike Honsa) for Cretin-Derham's state championship baseball team in 2001, Honsa started on the  back nine Friday, and birdied. the 11th and 12th holes. But he then bogeyed the par-3 13th and par-4 14th. All four of the par 5s at Southview are playing less than 500 yards this weekend, which makes them essentially par 4s for Honsa and the other long hitters. As you would expect, he capped off his round with 4s at the 488-yard 17th and the 475-yard 18th holes. 

With his 65, Honsa leads the Amateur Standings by four strokes over his CDH teammate Sam Udovich. This is Honsa's first time playing the Tapemark, but Udovich played last year. He was third among the amateurs, with a 54-hole total of 210 (67-75-68), and  three days after that, the then St. Croix Lutheran freshman won the state Class AA high school championship with a 36-hole tab of 142 (71-71) at Ridges at Sand Creek. Having won that state title while at SCL, Udavich  transferred to Cretin-Derham for the 2022-23 school year.

Doeden, who finished fourth last year with an aggregate of 202 (66-67-69), made six birdies and no bogeys on Day 1 this year. Starting on No. 1, he birdied the first and second holes and added birdies on both of the front-nine par 5s, the fourth and the sixth holes. He got to 5 under with a birdie at the par-4 11th and got to 6 under with a birdie at the 17th. But he didn't birdie the 18th, and there are a lot of pros in close pursuit of him going into Saturday's second round. Robert Bell, another former Gopher, who lost the 2018 Tapemark to Ross Miller in a playoff, is at the head of the pack of pursuers -- one behind with a 66. Yet another former Gopher, two-time defending champion Angus Flanagan, is one of three players who are two back at 67. Flanagan set course and tournament records last year, when he shot 61 in the final round  and won by three with a record tying total of 197.  Also at 67 so far  is the monstrously long-hitting Trey Fessler -- even by modnern standards, he's ridiculously long . He was the runner-up to Flanagan last year And the other member of the threesome at 67 is Jeff Sorenson, a seven-time Minnesota PGA Player of the Year who won this tournament in 2009.    


Tapemark Minnesota PGA Pro-Am

At Southview Country Club

Par 71, 6,062 yards

West St. Paul

First-round results 

T1. Justin Doeden                    65

T1. Joe Honsa (a).                   65

3. Robert Bell                           66

T4. Angus Flanagan.               67

T4. Jeff Sorenson.                   67

T4. Trey Fessler                      67

T7. Andy Smith.                      68

T7. Van Holmgren                  68

T9. Sam Udovich (a)              69

T9. Christopher Sauer.          69

T9. Andrew Israelson            69

T9. Ryan Helminjen              69