Heartbreak

I need you to study that photo. First off, please notice the red jacket (and the gray pants leg) all the way to the left. That's the BTN cameraman. His job was to get the team's reaction on 18 after Jake Birdwell's birdie putt. After Birdwell missed, meaning that UCLA won by one stroke, he stayed on the team. Tears sell Rotel, so he's focused in on Jackson Buchanan in tears and Max Herendeen staring out into the void and Ryan Voois pacing slowly staring at the grass.

I'm guilty too, of course. I have my camera pointed in their direction. I didn't want the team to see me taking a photo, so I waited until Jackson and Ryan turned away, but let's not get this twisted. If I'm gonna say "tears sell Rotel" then I need to admit that taking a photo of BTN taking a video of them isn't far off from that.

These are the stakes, of course. When you accept a scholarship to play golf in college, you know that at some point, there might be a camera pointed at your tears. This is not a "look at what BTN did!" opener. This is "look at how heartbreaking this moment was."

Jackson had missed a short putt on 18. Ryan had missed a short putt on 17. Max had missed putts on 13 and 15. If any of those had fallen, Illinois would have gone to a playoff against UCLA. This wasn't Jake's fault. He did his job, going -1 on the final two holes and giving the hole a look on 18 for back-to-back birdies. Someone else needed to make one late putt, and it just didn't happen. UCLA +2, Illinois +3. UCLA wins the Big Ten Championship.