With new caddie, Cameron Young shoots front-nine 27 in win

AUSTIN, Texas – Nothing like showing off for the new caddie.

Cameron Young, in his first round with his new (veteran) bag man Paul Tesori, started his opening match of the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play with nine straight 3s for a front-nine 27, riding the impressive start to a 3-and-2 victory over Davis Thompson on Wednesday.

“I don’t think I could have done a whole lot better on that front nine,” said Young, last season’s PGA TOUR Rookie of the Year. “I really didn’t miss one.”

Indeed, it was a run of 3s that would’ve made Stephen Curry proud.

"Impressive is an understatement,” said Tesori.

Young was playing for the first time with Tesori, the TOUR player-turned-caddie who forged his career carrying clubs for Vijay Singh and then, most recently, Webb Simpson. Tesori and Simpson, who became best friends, announced their amicable parting after 12 years together on Monday. In a statement on social media, Simpson blessed the partnership between his longtime looper and one of the game’s up-and-comers, who’s also a fellow Wake Forest alum and frequent practice-round partner of Simpson’s.

It didn’t take long for the new partnership to bear fruit.

“Yeah, 27 is pretty ridiculous,” Tesori said. “I think me and Webber might’ve had a 28 once.”

Thompson, 5 down at the turn, rallied with an eagle and two birdies on the back nine, but Young answered with two more birdies, his seventh and eighth of the round, to close it out.

Asked to describe the most impressive shot his boss hit on the front nine, Tesori didn’t hesitate. It was Young’s second shot at the par-5 sixth hole, from the right trees.

“The ball was in heavy rough, and we had around 227 front, 257 pin,” Tesori said. “He landed it about 70 yards short and it chased up, went out of view, reappeared, and stopped 4 feet away. It was an Evel Knievel shot, probably a once-every-five-years type of shot.”

Young’s only pars on the front nine came at the par-3 fourth and seventh holes, the latter of which saw him miss a birdie try from 13 feet. He missed a 12-foot birdie putt at the par-4 10th hole for his 10th straight 3.

“We misread it,” Tesori said.

Not until the 11th hole, when his new caddie mentioned that he’d shot 8 under par on the front nine, did Young even realize he’d made nine consecutive 3s. The key, he said, was his deadeye putting, and that began at the short, par-4 first, where Thompson bogeyed and conceded his opponent’s birdie putt from 14 feet. Young putted it, anyway, and made it.

He kept making them from there,

“It was great,” he said of his first competitive round with Tesori. “I've obviously been around him a lot. Webb and I played a practice round together 22 times this past year, so I've been around him a ton, so it's really comfortable.

“I think he just brings a ton of energy,” Young added, “which is good for me. I'm kind of pretty flat-lined. But it's been great so far. Obviously did well today, so I'm excited for the rest of the week.”

Young will take on Corey Conners on Thursday and Sepp Straka on Friday as he tries to emerge from Pool 15.