2025 Final
Blue Retains Cup as Captains Battle for Final Winning Point
October 5, 2025
After a weekend of constant back and forth that led to a 10-10 tie, Captain Brad Juday parred the 18th hole to defeat Captain Frank George, and win the 11th point for Blue.
The two captains came to the 18th hole tied, after Frank George sunk a key six foot putt on the 17th hole to save the Cup. After George hit his tee shot over the still growing knoll of trees on the right, Juday hit a ball right through the middle of the trees. He hit a strong second shot hybrid to 83 yards. From there he hit a wedge to about 15 feet and then calmly rolled in the putt for par.
The entire day featured comebacks and reversals of fortune, as did the entire weekend. Blue opened the event winning 3 1/2 points in fourball. The last half point arose from a comeback by rookie Wade Johnston and Captain Juday, who were down four holes with five to play and scratched a half point when Juday bogeyed the last hole.
On Saturday afternoon, Red achieved a mirror image by winning 3 1/2 points, and the last half point arose from a comeback engineered by Captain George and Rick Gordon, who were down two after fourteen but parred both the par threes and won on 18.
So Saturday ended at 5-5 because of strong play by both captains on the 18th hole. It would be a strong precursor to Sunday.
Sunday featured 11 matches. After JonDeAngelis pasted Ron George in a matched played quickly and with the two riding in separate carts, Red led 6-5. As Sunday developed, each of the remaining foursomes saw split matches, with Blue and Red each winning won. If that formula held up, Red would win the cup 11-10, and for most of the afternoon, this was the projected result.
It looked even worse for Blue earlier, when Mark Williams fell four behind Jamie Grace on the 8th hole. "Remmo" had missed the Saturday matches with an ankle injury from a hockey game earlier in the week, and it didn't look like he was able to put the proper weight onto his legs to hit shots. But Williams' play moved over to the also-injured Red player; Grace was nursing his own recovery with two recently replaced hips, and he faltered on the back, letting Williams back in. When Grace, hit the wrong ball on 15th, Williams took a lead he would not relinquish, though the match went to 18.
So in the first pair of matches, Williams and Olenik won. 7-6 Red.
In the second pair, the two Hacketts won. Adam Hackett pasted Rick Gordon and Dennis Hackett outlasted David Best, winning at 18, a split group and Red led 8-7.
In the third group, Paul Morgan beat up on Dan Maletich, and Jimmy Gurney lost to Billy George in a match with a lot of great shots by both players. Another split, and Red led 9-8.
Red reached its tenth point early when Tom Bres played the best match of his life (only 8 over through 14) to beat Will Bass. Red was at 10-8 and need only one of the last three matches to win the Cup. Blue need to scrape out just 2 1/2 points from the remaining three to retain.
And Red led two of those matches fairly late. Dom Spadafore was up on Glenn Peggs through 14. Peggs parred 15 to pull even and then made a great chip on 18 to steal the full point away from Red.
Red 10-9. Red needed just one of the two points in the final group.
Bill Sedwick continued his unbelievable undefeated pairs record, winning a close match against Ron George Sr. at 16.
10-10. All the focus came on the captains beginning at 17. Brad Juday did not want the attention. He later said that he put himself against the Red captain hoping they could shake hands somewhere on the 15th hole upon hearing that the cup had been settled ahead. To avoid the spotlight, Juday teed off on 17 before anyone had the chance to see. The committee ruled that Frank George could ask Juday to re-tee since he hadn't been allowed to see the previous shot. He allowed Juday to keep a fairly playable ball near the green.
The pressure had shifted to Red. Blue needed only a half point to retain the Cup. Frank George faced an uphill must-make six foot putt at 17, and with the help of RG Sr, read it well and calmly sank it, pushing the matches to 18.
As it would turn out, he'd need to make three on 18 as Juday's four sealed the Cup for Blue. Juday raced to the clubhouse, filled the cup with beer, and triumphantly drank from the Cup and raised it, saluting a second straight Blue victory.
By the Numbers
32 Cups, 646 Matches: What the Record Book Says
by Claude · September 2026
Thirty-two Cups and 646 matches into this thing, Blue leads the series 19–12–1 and has won two straight. The longest run belongs to Blue, five in a row from 2012 through 2016; Red's best is four straight, 2008 through 2011. For all the lopsided years, the Cup is usually close. Twelve of the 32 have been decided by two points or fewer, including the 12–12 halve in 2000 and last fall's 11–10.
Where does Blue's lead come from? Almost entirely from Sunday. In the team formats the two sides are dead level: Foursomes stands at exactly 80½–80½ over 161 matches, and Red actually leads Four-Ball 83½–78½. But in the Pairs matches Blue leads 181½–141½. The whole series edge has been built one-on-one.
And yet Saturday is usually where the Cup is won. In the 26 years one side led after Saturday, that side went on to win the Cup 22 times. Only three Sunday rallies have overturned a Saturday deficit — 1994, 1995 and 2007 — plus 2000, when Blue came back from 7–5 down to halve the Cup. Six Saturdays have ended all square (1997, 2002, 2010, 2019, 2020 and 2025), and Blue won four of those Cups, last year's included.
These matches go long. 227 of the 646 have reached the 18th hole — 35 percent, and by far the most common place for a match to end; the 17th is a distant second at 113. There have been only 58 pastings, and 59 matches have been halved. The Cup is also getting tighter: in the 2020s, 40 percent of matches have gone the distance, up from about a third in each earlier decade. The biggest margin on record is 9 & 8, in the 2010 Sunday singles.
The handicap strokes may not be quite enough. In the Pairs, the player receiving strokes has won just 41 percent of the time (110 of 269), with another 28 halved. Foursomes is tougher still: the side getting strokes has won only 35 percent. Four-Ball is the one format where strokes seem to even things out, at 51 percent. Oddly, a big gap doesn't hurt: when ten or more strokes changed hands in singles, the receiver won 16 of 34 and halved three more.
A few players have been there for nearly all of it. Ron George has played in every one of the 32 Cups, 97 matches in all. Jon DeAngelis and Dennis Hackett have played 31, Jamie Grace 30 and Brad Juday 27. DeAngelis has the most wins of anyone with 50, and Grace has the most halves with 13. Among players with 30 or more matches, Jeff Hackett owns the best winning percentage at 71 percent (25–9–5), followed by Mike Walters at 65 and Bob Walters at 61. Put the Walters brothers together and they are 9–2–1.
Some Sunday matchups keep coming back. DeAngelis and Ron George have met seven times in singles, more than any other pair, and DeAngelis leads 5–2 after winning again last fall. Brad Juday has faced Frank George six times and leads 5–1, including 1998 and last fall's Cup-clinching match on 18. Bill Sedwick is 4–0–1 against Ron George Sr., with wins in each of the last three years.
It's a family affair, too. A George has faced another George 29 times, and in their five singles meetings the Blue George has won four. The Hacketts have met three times in singles, and the Blue Hackett has won all three. Five players have worn both colors over the years, Bob Walters among them.
Finally, the pool. Since odds started showing up on the pairings in 2022, favorites are 21–12–4, and the heavy favorites (4-to-1 or heavier) have won only 11 of 17. The biggest upset came in the very first match of 2022, when a Blue team listed at 20-to-1 lost to Jimmy Gurney and Vince Olenik. As for the armband: David Best is 3–0 as a captain, but captains as a group are 81–83–22 in their own matches in the years they led the team. Captaining, it seems, doesn't help your own game.