Standing Tall

Just days after posting a top-10 finish in CGA Amateur west of Vail, CU golfer Parker Paxton beats a field full of top regional pros to become just second amateur ever to win Platte Valley Pro-Am in western Nebraska

By Gary Baines 

Whatever Parker Paxton lost in elevation as the week wore on, he gained in spots on the leaderboard.

The University of Colorado golfer recorded a top-10 showing — finishing eighth — at the CGA Amateur, which concluded on Thursday in Edwards at Sonnenalp Club, which sits at nearly 7,500 feet elevation.

Then Paxton made his way down the hills and into the western Nebraska town of Scottsbluff (elevation roughly 3,900 feet) to play in the Platte Valley Pro-Am, an event which draws many top regional pros, along with some amateurs.

There, Paxton not only held his own with those pros, but beat all of them (and all his fellow amateurs) to claim the same title current DP World Tour player Davis Bryant of Aurora won in 2024, not long after earning the Inspirato Colorado Open championship.

Paxton posted rounds of 69-68 over the weekend, good for a 7-under-par total and a one-stroke victory over pro Mark Baldwin of Mesa, Ariz., at Scotts Bluff Country Club. Among the other pros on or near the leaderboard behind Paxton were Coloradans Connor Jones, Derek Fribbs and Chace Nathe (fourth place) and Paxton’s CU associate head coach and two-time Colorado Open champion Derek Tolan (16th), plus Paxton’s older brother, Easton (ninth).

If Parker Paxton had been a pro, the win would have been worth $10,000. As he’s an amateur, he earned $1,000 in shop credit — a fact that hit home with a funny photo taken of Paxton holding a winner’s check with “$10,000” crossed out and “$1,000 shop credit” written in. Baldwin, as the highest-finishing pro, was awarded the $10,000.

No one else among the top 15 finishers was an amateur.

As a Scotts Bluff Country Club Facebook posted noted, Paxton becomes just the second amateur to win the Platte Valley Pro-Am overall title, joining Nate Lashley. Lashley, it should be noted, won the Colorado Open in 2010 and went on to capture one victory on the PGA Tour.

About the Writer: Gary Baines has covered golf in Colorado continuously since 1983. He was a sports writer at the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, then the sports editor there, and has written regularly for ColoradoGolf.org since 2009. The University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2022. He owns and operates ColoradoGolfJournal.com