2026 Massachusetts Amateur at Winchester Country Club

Here in 2026, the Massachusetts Amateur Championship was staged at one of greater Boston’s finest layouts: Winchester Country Club in Winchester, Massachusetts.

Like many courses in this area, the course at Winchester Country Club started out as nine holes, with the original nine of the current course being laid out by Alexander Findlay. Then, as the club began to acquire additional land and desire to expand the course, Donald Ross was brought in over a period of many years, starting in 1909, to create the 18-hole layout that is found here today.

The course at Winchester Country Club is perhaps one the boldest designs Ross completed in the greater Boston area. There is 165 feet of vertical elevation change that the course navigates through, and it wastes no time introducing the player to it and to challenging slopes and uneven lies. It is a course that is simultaneously visually breathtaking, and both physically and mentally demanding. Ross places bunkers on the course beautifully into the sides of slopes, and the greens are large and often protected by steep drop-offs and false fronts, placing immense value on strong iron play.

The golf course can be pushed to nearly 6900 yards in total length, and plays as a par 71, featuring one par 5 hole on the front nine, and back-to-back par 5 holes on the second nine. The field consisted of nearly 150 players to start the week. The Massachusetts Amateur consists of two primary components. The first two days are the stroke play component of the tournament. Over these two days, 36 holes of golf are played. Once concluded, the tournament then moves to rounds of match play, where the best 32 players move into rounds of match play for the remainder of the week, with the two final players playing 36 holes head-to-head on the final day to determine the champion.

The first hole at Winchester Country Club presented the players with a variety of options from the tee, making it a tremendous opening hole for match play and stroke play. As a short par 4, players hit everything from long irons to driver to position themselves either in the middle of the hole’s uphill left to right dogleg, or potentially just short of the hole’s long, slender green. The hole is visually striking from the tee, and right of the green drops of quite substantially.

The first par 5 is encountered early in the round at the second hole. The championship tee lies down the right slope from the first green, and the tee shot is blind and moves from left to right. A shot too far left ends up in rough and potentially having to deal with a large tree, but too far right greatly risks entering a creek that runs up that side of the hole. This was certainly one of the early holes to take advantage of for the competitors, and the approach is to an elevated green framed by strong bunkers on both sides.

Hole 3 features an elevated tee shot back down to the level of the second fairway. This par 4 features a great deal of trouble down the entirety of its right side all the way to the green, including the stream from the second hole, a pond, and a sharp drop-off on the right side of the green. The back tee is set at an angle rather than straight down the fairway, and many players missed the fairway to the left. The hole played just slightly over par for the week.

The course really starts to turn things up in difficulty at the fourth hole. This majestic 428 yard par 4 plays increasingly uphill as the hole progresses, and even the best of tee shots can still be left with a sloped lie off the hole’s rolling fairway. Too far right on this hole is out of bounds, and in his match in the quarterfinals against Matthew Naumec, Aidan Monahan would go on to lose this hole from a poor tee shot into this area. Players hitting it too far right often found tree trouble as well, and the narrow green is framed beautifully by deep bunkers on both sides. The hole played nearly a half-stroke over par for the championship.

Winchester’s fifth hole is another short par 4 moving around a tight bend, but from right to left rather than left to right like the first hole. The hole certainly dared the field to carry the bunkers and trees at the corner up to the green, but many players still opted to play for just beyond the bunkers. This approach still required proper judgement. Matthew Naumec hit his ball through the fairway on this hole, but managed an impressive recovery out of the long grass to just beyond the hole. The bunkers front left and right of the green are quite large, and the putting surface features an interesting shape with some tricky slopes.

Hole 6 is the course’s first par 3 hole, and it is a spectacular design. The hole is built directly out of the hillside that it occupies, and to the left of the green, the hole drops off very sharply and features several large, deep bunkers cut out of the slope. There really isn’t much room for error on this hole, and even if the miss is just short, the slope in front of the green is extremely severe. It is par 3 that truly demands precision and getting it to the putting surface at all costs.

The seventh hole is a short par 4 that plays straight away, but to a fairway that is greatly sloped from right to left. The hole features a bunker right in the middle of the fairway around the 300 yard mark, and the slope can easily make balls tumble down off the fairway and bring a tree into consideration. The green features two bunkers on the left and a more pointed section up front, offering a variety of pin positions. The sixth and the seventh holes also offer views of the city of Boston, one of the course’s most well-known visual features.

Winchester’s eighth hole is a visually striking uphill par 4 that can be played up to 464 yards. An enormous bunker complex comes into play as the hole begins to rise sharply up to the green, and it is one of the holes on the course that truly represents the sheer scale of the property the golf course occupies. The slopes and rough behind the green are extremely severe, and players that found themselves long of this green could easily lose the hole in match play by needing two shots to get to the putting surface. This happened to Matthew Naumec in his match against Aidan Monahan, and he would lose the hole because of this error.

Perhaps the hole Winchester Country Club is best known for, the stunning par 3 ninth is a downhill hole that is surrounded by seven cavernous bunkers. The slopes in front of the bunkers on the left side of the hole are quite steep, so a miss on this hole is certainly short and right. Getting up and down from these bunkers can be a tall order. In his match against Max McColgan in the Round of 16, CJ Winchenbaugh found one of these bunkers on the right from the tee and struggled to hold the green on the left coming up. He would bogey the hole and accelerate his match loss, which came a few holes later.

The back nine at Winchester begins with two exceptionally challenging holes that demand near-perfect iron shots. The tenth is a par 4 that moves gently from left to right. While from the tee, the hole may appear to be relatively simple, the second shot is to an elevated green that is perhaps the most intimidating on the golf course. It is enormous at nearly 50 yards deep, is pitched back to front, and features several tiers and distinct sloping sections. Missing on the wrong section of the green is truly penalizing, and the hole yielded more double bogeys than any other during the event.

To make the start of the back nine even more challenging, the players were then faced with Hole #11, a mammoth par 3 that features a template similar to Hole #6, but plays up to 234 yards long, forcing some players in the field to pull off a head cover. Like the sixth hole, the green is built out of the slopes to the right, and plunges down off the left to a set of two substantial bunkers. The slopes short and left of the hole are severely steep, and coming up short results in having to pitch the ball back up potentially 50 yards. It is a beautiful and demanding golf hole, and it played 0.53 shots over par for the entire week.

The chance to pick up a few strokes is presented at Winchester’s consecutive par 5 holes. Hole 12 is quite short and plays from an elevated tee. For much of the field in the event, getting on in two shots was a relatively straightforward task, but a large bunker left and a tree to the right were in play and provided some defense if the tee shot was played to them. The approach to the uphill green is well guarded by deep bunkers, a sharp drop-off to the right, and a small but very steep false front. Anything short will tumble back down the hill immediately. Most of the field was able to take advantage of the opportunity here, and 110 total birdies were made.

Architecturally speaking, the 13^th hole is one of the course’s most thought-provoking. This par 5 features an upper and lower fairway separated by a large slope covered in rough, and the upper fairway on the right side of the hole is visually blocked by a fascinating complex of bunkers. The prevailing strategy of the hole during the week was to push the tee shot as far down the upper fairway on the right as much as possible, which presents a clear shot to the green up and to the left. However, some players would go through the fairway on the right or even left with shots on the steep slope separating the fairway and forcing a layup. The bunker on the left side of the hole guards it quite well. Matthew Naumec found the steep front slope of this bunker in his match against Aidan Monahan, chipping it through the green from there, but he would still go on to make par.

The final par 3 of Winchester Country Club is the 14^th hole. This hole plays the shortest on the golf course at usually less than 150 yards, but the green features several tricky pin locations and slopes, and the cross bunkers that protect the front of the green are quite deep and well designed. For many players, calculating how far into the green to carry the tee shot was especially interesting for a front pin location. Matthew Naumec would nearly spin the ball off the front of the green, while Aidan Monahan, hitting second, took that learning to spin it back right next to the hole, making birdie and tying the match heading into the last four holes.

The closing stretch of par 4 holes at Winchester begins with the 15^th hole, and it is one of the course’s longest par 4 holes at nearly 460 yards. A bunker pinches in the fairway at around the 250 yard point, and while not really in play for long hitters, the tee shot is angled to the right of the hole rather than directly in front of it, which can bring the left-side rough into play quite easily. The entire right side of the hole plays along the nearby road, and up at the green, a long bunker is found off the right side as well. Long and left of the green is no good, as there is not much space behind it and the slopes left are quite steep. After his birdie on the 14^th, Aidan Monahan would pull his tee shot into the left rough, come up short of the green, and fail to make par after a difficult pitch to a back-right pin. It would be the first of three straight bogeys, and he would lose to Matthew Naumec 3&1 as a result.

Hole #16 presented the players with a tee shot that needed to be hit as straight as possible up the fairway. From the championship tee box, an enormous pine tree looms perfectly just off the left side of the fairway, and the raised slope and sharp drop-off to the right is in clear view as well. Up and over the top of the slope that can be seen from the tee is a another section of downhill slopes before the hole plunges down into a valley to the green, which is angled, quite pitched, and beautifully framed by four large bunkers. The elevation change from the fairway to the green makes calculating the right club paramount. The visuals on this hole are quite stunning as well, as the first hole can be seen moving up the slopes behind the green.

A walk up the bridge to the right of the 16^th green leads to the tee for the 17^th hole. This 428 yard par 4 is wonderfully shaped and features a string of three bunkers running along the left side of the fairway and a hill of tall grasses and a tree to the right. The green is beautifully tucked away into this corner of the property, framed by tall trees on both sides, two large bunkers immediately to the left, and a curious bunker short right with a mound of grass at its center. It features a false front as well, so precision is certainly called for on the approach.

At 453 yards and moving down and to the right off the tee, Winchester Country Club’s par 4 18^th is as challenging as one could want a finishing hole to be. The hole is sloped from left to right during much of its layout and begins to turn from right to left at about the 300 yard mark. Missing to the left on this hole can be disastrous, and there are a series of bunkers, trees, and rough that factor into missing the fairway on the right. There is a slender bunker perched up on the hill on the left just as the turn of the hole is completed. The green is pitched quite significantly, has two tiers, a steep front section, and wraps around a large bunker on the left, making it possible to have several challenging hole locations. The hole played the 3^rd hardest for the week, and with how brilliant its design is, it truly tested the field.

The week of the tournament saw some rather tough weather early on, and the stoke play portion of the event did not finish on time. Max McColgan and Joseph Lenane finished tied for first in the stoke play component of the event with scores of three under par, followed by Matthew Naumec and Patrick Kilcoyne at two under, and three players, including Winchester’s Aidan Monahan, at one under. With the tough conditions, six over par was good enough to have a shot at match play.

During the round of 16, Max McColgan, Matthew Naumec, and Aidan Monahan moved through the tournament well and won their matches with significant margins. Winchester member Owen Egan would take down Patrick Kilcoyne that round as well, and Aidan Emmerich and Zachary Georgantas would also move on.

In the quarterfinals, Monahan and Egan would go on to lose their matches, and with that, the Winchester contingent was out of the rest of the tournament. Aidan Emmerich would go on to win quite handily against Max McColgan, and Georgantas and Jake Mrva would each win their matches 1 up.

The finals of the tournament, a 36 hole match play round, featured Aidan Emmerich and Zachary Georgantas. At the start of the round, Emmerich would go one up with a birdie on one, but giving it back on two with a bogey to return the match to all square. From there, Emmerich made birdie and par on holes three and four to go two up, and he would hold that margin until losing the ninth hole.

By the end of hole 13, Georgantas would manage to bring the match back to all square with an impressive run of making a three and a four on holes 12 and 13. Emmerich would then go on to birdie the short par 3 14^th hole, and from here he never let go. On the 37^th hole, he would go on to make another birdie on Winchester’s first hole. Both players would birdie the par 5 second hole, but Emmerich would yet again win on holes three and four. By the end of the third nine, the match was all but finished, as Emmerich took total command and was then 6 up. He would tie the tenth hole, and then close out the tournament in dramatic fashion with back-to-back wins on holes 11 and 12, finishing the match against Georgantas 8&6.

Throughout the week, Emmerich played an exceptional tournament. He had finished tied for eighth in the rounds of stoke play, shooting 69 and 73. In his first match play round, he would make a critical par on the 18^th hole to finish 1 up, and from there he would go on to win his next matches 4&3, 4&3, 2 up, and as mentioned, 8&6 to take home the title.

Next year’s Massachusetts Amateur is slated to be staged at Willowbend in Mashpee.