Five players 23 and under to watch at the U.S. Open

More than 100 years ago, 19-year-old John McDermott became the youngest winner of the U.S. Open – a record that’s never been topped.

While that record will stand again this year, that doesn’t mean youth won’t be served at The Los Angeles Country Club.

Under the bright lights of Hollywood, there is no shortage of young stars-in-waiting hoping to earn the top award in a leading role by the end of the week.

Out of the more than 10,000 initial entries into this year’s U.S. Open at LACC, here are five potential big names 23 and under who could make noise during the season’s third major.

Frankie Capan III

Age: 23

Capan, a Korn Ferry Tour rookie who worked his way through Q-School last fall with his mom on the bag, qualified at Old Chatham Golf Club in Durham, North Carolina. (Once again, his mom was on the bag.) Capan was medalist at his Local Qualifying site in Texas before finishing tied for third at 11 under, just one back of medalist honors, at Final Qualifying.

Capan has played 11 events so far this season on the Korn Ferry Tour and has notched four top-25 finishes. In two of his last four starts he’s finished inside the top 10 and will come to the U.S. Open off his second-best result of the year, a tie for sixth at the UNC Health Championship presented by STITCH.

Capan is one of the Korn Ferry Tour’s longest hitters, sitting 20th in Driving Distance. He’s also 15th in Scrambling – a combination that should help around the tricky LACC.

This is Capan’s first major championship start.

Ryan Gerard

Age: 23

A course record and a hole-in-one. That’s part of the reason why Gerard was able to earn his way into this year’s U.S. Open.

Gerard, who earned Special Temporary Membership on the PGA TOUR just a few weeks ago, fired a 7-under 63 at Toronto’s Lambton Golf and Country Club which included an ace on the par-3 12th in the first round of the qualifier. He backed it up with a 4-under 66 in the afternoon to earn medalist honors at the Canadian site by three shots.

Gerard managed to nab Special Temporary Membership thanks in large part to a fourth-place result at The Honda Classic. He added in a tie for 11th at the Puerto Rico Open the next week. This marks his second consecutive U.S. Open appearance; last year at Final Qualifying, he shared co-medalist honors at The Club at Admirals Cove in Florida.

The University of North Carolina alum made the cut at the RBC Canadian Open last week and is one of the TOUR’s most solid in Strokes Gained: Approach the Green.

Preston Summerhays

Age: 20

Summerhays, a sophomore at Arizona State University, fired a tidy 62 in the second round at Final Qualifying in Los Angeles and survived a next-day, 3-for-2 playoff to earn a spot in the U.S. Open for the second time.

The 2019 U.S. Junior Amateur champion is No. 28 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking. His scoring average at ASU is just a tick under 70, and he was named the Pac-12 Freshman of the Year in 2022 after notching eight top-10 results in 13 events.

He most recently helped ASU qualify for the match-play portion of the recent NCAA Championship.

It’s also been quite the summer for the Summerhays family, as Preston Summerhays’ sister, Grace, has qualified for the U.S. Women’s Open, and his uncle, Joe, will be in the field at the U.S. Senior Open.

Gordon Sargent

Age: 20

Amateur Gordon Sargent was the medalist at the Ball Ground, Georgia site after rounds of 64-67. Sargent was the 2022 NCAA champion and is competing in his second major of the season, after earning a special invite to the Masters in April.

Sargent, the world’s No. 1-ranked amateur, is inching closer to earning a PGA TOUR card via the PGA TOUR University Accelerated program. Twenty points are needed, and Sargent has 14. He’ll earn one for teeing it up at LACC, and another if he makes the cut. He would earn two more points for a top-20 finish.

Sargent, whose speed off the tee was the talk of the practice rounds at Augusta National, became just the ninth freshman in history to win the NCAA Division I individual title when he accomplished the feat last year, and he was also named the nation’s top freshman golfer in 2022.

Michael Thorbjornsen

Age: 21

This will mark Thorbjornsen’s third U.S. Open. He made the cut in 2019 – the only junior to do it since the exemption for the winner of the U.S. Junior Amateur championship was introduced.

The Pac-12 Golfer of the Year at Stanford earned medalist honors at his Final Qualifying site in Summit, New Jersey after rounds of 66-68. Thorbjornsen finished fourth at last year’s Travelers Championship and T20 at this year’s Hero Dubai Desert Classic.

Thorbjornsen helped Stanford get to the NCAA Championship and also represented Team USA at the 2022 Palmer Cup. He’s one of four members of Stanford’s men’s golf team to tee it up at this week’s U.S. Open.