Click here to view original story - written by The Citizen Writer Ryan O'Leary
PENACOOK - Jim Cilley couldn't help but think back to the movie Miracle and Herb Brooks' famous quote. Facing defending State Amateur champ Nick MacDonald for 36 holes, he knew he had to play his very best to win.
"One game. If we played 'em 10 times, they might win nine. But not this game. Not tonight."
Yes, Saturday was Cilley's time.
Belmont's Class of '99 golf star won the N.H. State Am Championship, holding off the 22-year-old MacDonald with a 6-foot par putt on the 36th hole. It was the culmination of Cilley's finest performance in a match-play tournament, the very type that gave him trouble in the past.
"Once I got up a few in the morning, I knew I could beat him," Cilley said of MacDonald. "That he wasn't invincible."
Cilley had never reached the Round of 16 in his first seven cracks. But this year was different. The short, open course at Nashua Country Club put the strength of his game - his wedge play - on display. He had longtime friend and 2005 Amateur champ Craig Cyr as his caddy. And he found his putting stroke, eliminating a slight pause in his back swing that made everything flow smoother.
"This year I got the breaks when I needed them," said Cilley, whose miraculous chip off a patch of bare dirt on 16 sparked him past Ryan Kohler in the semis. "It's kind of luck of the draw, too. Not that the guys I played were bad by any means... but I didn't have to play a former champ who has a reputation in match play."
Not until the final. Saturday's match went back-and-forth until Cilley, in a span of eight holes, turned a two-hole deficit into a 4-up advantage entering his final trip through the back nine. Those last nine holes had been good to him in match play, but he had a pair of double bogeys on hole 10 in Saturday's final, and the second sparked MacDonald, who won three of four holes, to pull within one with five to play.
But Cilley had a steady hand from there. He hit for par on each of those final five holes, sinking a down-hill, left-to-right putt on 18 to clinch the championship.
"It went in and it was just like this release," Cilley said. "It was an out-of-body experience. I didn't even realize that I yelled as loudly as I did. I was like, 'Did I just do that?'"
He did, and it was starting to sink in Sunday morning when he was invited on as a guest with WGAM radio. He figured he had over 80 text messages on his phone, including Kohler and some of the other players to congratulate him. He hasn't even gotten to all the voicemails.
"When you start the week, you don't realize if you do win how it's going to be," said Cilley, who will do another radio show today on 107.7 FM at 1 p.m. "It's been a whirlwind."
The championship match was one of momentum. Cilley birdied the first hole and was 3-up through four. He maintained that edge with a birdie on the par-3 ninth. MacDonald was better over the back 9, winning 10, 11 and 12 to square the match. MacDonald added a birdie on 14 to move 1-up and took that lead to the break.
Cilley faced his biggest deficit of the match when MacDonald went 2-up with a birdie to start Round 2. Then it was Cilley's turn to surge. He birdied the second and MacDonald bogeyed the third to square the match, and Cilley won four of six holes to move 4-up - the largest gap of the match.
With nine holes left, the match was far from over. MacDonald birdied 13, and Cilley's lead was suddenly 1-up heading to the 14th tee. But Cilley used a clutch wedge shot on 15 to get back on track, and he was walking to his ball on 18 when he heard a race official reminding staff that a playoff hole would take place at the first tee.
Cilley, of course, would have to lose the hole for that to happen.
"I turned to Craig and I said 'That ain't happening. We're not going to (hole) 1. I'm not going to let this get away,'" Cilley said.
He plans to take a few days off after the marathon week. He still has the State Open this summer along with a stroke play tournament at Green Meadow Golf Club in Hudson.
And he won't have Cyr, so critical to his success in the State Am, as his caddy in the Open. He'll be facing him.
"I can't say enough about Craig Cyr," Cilley said. "Not a chance I win this tournament without him."
Also:
Interview on WGAM New Hampshire Sports Radio
Cilley upsets MacDonald in up-and-down final - Union Leader
