The Porter Cup tees off at 7:30 am on Wednesday the 24th. 1st and 2nd round groups are the same, then players will be reassigned, based on score. Early groups on Wednesday go off later on Thursday, and vice-versa. 2nd round tee times are either 2.5 hours later or earlier, depending on 1st round position. We’ve determined that the following groups are the critical ones to see on Wednesday and Thursday. By trophy time on Saturday, the winner will have emerged from one of these groups. You’ll be able to brag that you followed the champion before anyone else knew the story. Here goes!

1. 11:10/8:40     Kevin O’Connell, the current USGA Mid-Amateur champion, tees off with Noah Norton (Georgia Tech) and Josh Whalen (Kent State.) O’Connell is the most likely mid-am to challenge for the title.

2. 11:20/8:50     Includes Matt Parziale (2017 US Mid-Am champ), Garrett Rank, and Tyler Strafaci. 2 are out of college, while Strafaci is a senior at Georgia Tech. He and Parziale hope to catch the eye of Nathaniel Crosby, USA Walker Cup captain, who will be on site Friday and Saturday. Strafaci finished 5th last week at the Players Amateur.

3. 11:00/8:30     The top two golfers by WAGR Ranking are in this game. Chun An Yu (#7) and John Pak (#22) will tee off with Scott Harvey (2014 US Mid-Am champion.) On paper, the strongest grouping.

4. 9:00/11:30     Local favorite #1, Ben Reichert of East Amherst, competes with Koichiro Ishika (Arizona State) and John Catanzaro (Georgia).

5. 8:00/10:30     Local favorite #2, David Hanes of Elma, matches up with John Felitto (Notre Dame) and Sudarshan Yellamaraju (Canadian Junior Team).

6. 8:20/10:50     Matthew Riedel, an incoming freshman at Vanderbilt, goes off with Blake Dyer (Florida) and Bradley Reeves (Arizona.)

7. 11:30/9:00     James Piot (Michigan State) had a top-25 finish last week at the Players Amateur. He pegs it with Herbie Aikens and Adrian Norford, possibly the first golfer from St. Kitts to compete in the Porter Cup.