‘At a loss for words.’ Summit’s Brody Grieb outlasts Mountainside’s Collin Hodgkinson in epic battle, leads Storm to record-breaking team title at Oregon 6A boys golf championships
By René Ferrán
On Saturday evening, Summit boys golf coach Andy Heinly received a text from junior Brody Grieb.
Grieb wrote that he wasn’t sure if he could play in this week’s OSAA Class 6A golf championships because of a back injury he suffered shortly after he shot a second-round 87 at the Mountain Valley district championships.
“We were talking then, and he goes, ‘Am I even going to go?’” Heinly recalled.
The Storm arrived in Corvallis the next day for a practice round at Trysting Tree Golf Club, and as Grieb stretched out his sore back, he and Heinly worked on shortening his swing to alleviate his pain.
“And as I’m watching the practice round, he made like four birdies in a row, and I’m like, ‘Here he goes,’” Heinly said.
Grieb shot a 6-under 65 to take the lead in Monday’s first round, then followed with a 69 on Tuesday, making clutch putts throughout the back nine and getting up and down on the closing hole to hold off Mountainside senior Collin Hodgkinson by one stroke and help lead the Storm to the team title in record fashion.
“I didn’t think I was going to be able to play, but to get over that injury and get out here and do this is incredible,” Grieb said. “It’s surreal, like I can’t describe it. I’m at a loss for words.”
Instead, we’ll leave it to Heinly to describe what it was like watching his No. 5 golfer beat out a trio of Division I-bound teammates and Oregon State signee Hodgkinson to become Summit’s first individual champion.
“Just some of the things he did out there, the ups and downs when he was beating the pressure put on him and all that, was just so fun to watch,” Heinly said. “You see his demeanor. Brody is just pretty even-keeled, and he never wavered. He just kept going.”
Along with Grieb, Washington State signee Sam Renner matched the day’s low round with a 66 to finish third at 136, and seniors Lucas Hughes (a Central Christian student who signed with Grand Canyon) and Ethan Jaehn (a Central Michigan signee) tied for seventh at 141.
The result was a 16-under 552 total that broke the all-time 18-hole (12-under 272 in the second round) and 36-hole tournament records.
“These guys all grew up together, and it’s a special group,” Heinly said. “I knew they always had this in them. All of these guys can break par. It was just a matter of when they could all do it together, and it’s been phenomenal to watch them do that.”
Grieb overcame an uneven start to get to 9-under with back-to-back birdies to open the back nine.
At that point, Hodgkinson had also been experiencing a wild ride, mixing four birdies with three bogeys and a double bogey through 11 holes to fall six shots back.
Grieb bogeyed the 12th to create an opening, which Hodgkinson barged through by acing the short par-3 No. 13, one-hopping the ball into the hole for his fourth career hole-in-one but first in a stroke-play tournament.
The lead remained three strokes until the par-5 No. 16, when Hodgkinson reached the green in two but faced a 30-foot sidewinding eagle putt. Grieb came up about 20 yards short of the green, then saw his chip roll to a stop 12 feet below the hole.
Hodgkinson’s putt rose over and along the ridge, then turned right and dropped. Suddenly, the lead was just one stroke.
“At that point, I knew it was a must-make,” he said. “I hit a great shot into the green, and I just felt really comfortable over the putt.”
Unfazed, Grieb buried his birdie putt to restore a two-stroke edge with two to play.
“He had so much momentum going, and I knew that he wasn’t going to slow down anytime soon,” Grieb said. “So, I had to make sure I got something going, and that’s what I did.”
That make proved even bigger when Grieb blitzed his 40-foot birdie putt on the par-3 No. 17, hitting the flagstick and watching his ball roll 15 feet down the adjoining slope beside Hodgkinson’s marker.
“I just had way more adrenaline pumping than I’d ever had before,” Grieb said. “But I got out of it with a 4, when it could have been much worse.”
Both two-putted from there, leaving Grieb with a one-shot lead heading to the par-4 No. 18.
With the wind picking up for the first time, both Hodgkinson and Grieb missed the green left — Hodgkinson just short but on the same tier as the front pin placement, while Grieb was higher up the hill and faced a tricky sideway pitch.
“I’d been chipping horribly the last two days, and that’s usually the strongest part of my game,” Grieb said. “So, I knew I just had to forget about what had happened and go ahead and hit the best shot I could.”
He put plenty of air on the chip, which nestled about 5 feet above the hole. Hodgkinson went next and made a good run up the slope, with the ball settling 2 feet short.
“That was so much fun to go neck-and-neck with Collin,” Grieb said. “But yeah, that was nerve-racking.”
