By Jeff Johncox
Nathan Chambers has been a golf fan as far back as he can remember.
His mom, Susan, said Nathan would watch the sport on TV when he was 2 or 3 years old.
“All the other kids were watching cartoons, he was watching golf,” she said.
When Chambers was a little older, and started playing, he became, like the rest of the world, a Tiger Woods fan.
The soon-to-be senior at Purcell has become one of the top young golfers in the state, and Sunday he added his second straight Norman City Championship to his resume with a strong 1-under 71 at Jimmie Austin OU Golf Club in the tournament’s final round.
“It feels pretty good,” Chambers said of winning his second straight City Championship before he even graduated high school. “I guess that’s what everybody says when they win. I think I played solid all three days. I’ve played with all these guys before and it’s pretty relaxing when you know who you’re playing with. I played with Taylor (Artman) and Brad (Purcell) all three rounds, and I even played with Brad through two rounds last year.”
Chambers has been playing in tournaments since he was 8 or 9 years old. Back then, it was the nine-hole tournaments from the red tees.
Now he’s running away from the field from the tips.
“He’s loved golf since he was a baby,” Chambers’ dad, Mike, said. “He was two and already loved to putt.”
A young lifetime of playing golf has given Chambers a long drive and solid short game.
He’s already committed to play at Oklahoma once he graduates next year, and Sunday, he got a chance to show off his driver on the Sooners’ home course.
Length is a major asset at the OU Golf Club. With a total 7,380 yards, it’s the longest of the three courses in the City Championship.
The Trails is 6,600 yards and Westwood Park’s is 6,100.
Chambers was ripping it off the tee Sunday.
On the par-4, 441-yard 14th hole, Chambers drove it 340-plus yards.
With a slight breeze at his back on the par-4, 483-yard 17th, he cracked it past 350.
“Sometimes you just hit ’em,” Chambers said. “I really did like how I was hitting my driver today. Some days you just get into that groove where you’re hitting them harder and harder and they’re going straight.”
Blake Garland, who sat in fourth place going into the final round, grabbed second with a final-round 74. He finished at 213, six shots behind Chambers.
“It was a tough day,” Garland said. “This golf course is really hard. It was long before, but they’ve made it even longer now … And it’s never easy playing against Nathan Chambers.”
Artman and Purcell, who were in the final group with Chambers, finished tied for fourth place at 215 and J.R. Hurley was third at 214 after a final-round 72, the only other par-or-better round on the day besides Chambers’ 1-under.
The story of the weekend was the heat, though, and temperatures once again soared above 100 degrees.
But as many golfers pointed out, it was the same for everyone.
“You get used to (the heat) playing here in Oklahoma,” Garland said. “It’s fair for everybody. We all have to play through it.”
Chambers didn’t even get to enjoy his victory very long. Just 20 minutes after his round ended, he was off to Tulsa for the Oklahoma Golf Association’s stroke play tournament.
“It’s another three days in the heat,” he said.
Jeff Johncox
366-3535
jjohncox@normantranscript.com
