BERMUDA – Former Mass Open runner-up Eric Dugas mastered the wind to capture the Dark n Stormy World Par 3 Championship, which concluded Saturday at Turtle Hill Golf Club. Dugas, 36, who grew up in the Cape Cod town of Brewster, carded a 1-over par 55 to finish the 36-hole championship at 3-under 105. He won by three strokes and took home $10,000 for the victory.
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“My only goal was to just keep the ball where you can chip and putt it,” Dugas told the Bermuda newspaper The Royal Gazette after the win.
“I just tried to control the ball, keep it low off the tee like everyone else was trying to do, and was just able to execute and made some putts.”
LPGA pro Megan Khang, 22, of Rockland, carded the best score of all players in the second round, shooting a 7-under-par 51. Khang (58-51–109) made birdie on six of her first 10 holes Saturday to place T4 overall, but she finished with the best score among women. Despite a double bogey on the 13th and bogey on the 14th, she shot par the rest of the way.
“I started off pretty strong,” Khang told the The Royal Gazette. “I was playing freely and enjoying the round, enjoying the company and was able to make a lot of putts on the front nine.
“Overall, I think an under par round on this course is always an accomplishment, so I’m definitely happy.”
Meanwhile, Thorny Lea GC’s Shannon Johnson and Megan Buck competed in the Amateur Division, almost entire filled with men. Johnson made birdie twice to finish fourth overall (62-66–128), leading all amateur women, and Buck finished T15 (61-77–138).
Dugas made birdie six times and made bogey only three times in the tournament. He climbed to the top of the leaderboard with an 4-under 50 in the first round and made par on 15 of the final 18 holes to keep his lead.
Dugas, who finished runner-up in the 2014 Mass Open, previously worked as a club pro at Old Sandwich in Plymouth and Eastward Ho! in Chatham. He now lives and works as a golf professional at Makena Golf and Beach Club on Maui, Hawaii. He played in the SONY Open, the first PGA TOUR event of the 2020 season, and with the win in Bermuda, he secured exemption to the PGA TOUR Bermuda Championship at Port Royal Golf Course in October.
Khang, who took home $2,937 for her performance, last played in an LPGA event in January. After a month-long break, the Tour is set to resume with the Volvik Founds Cup in Phoenix from March 19-22.
Johnson, the 2018 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion, and Buck, a quarterfinalist in last year’s U.S. Women’s Mid-Am, will likely be mainstays in both Mass Golf Women’s Championships and USGA events. during the 2020 season.
