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MASTERS PREVIEW: Canadians Hughes, Conners and Weir head to Augusta

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With spring and the arrival of the Masters, Canadians are very excited about golf. If you’re lucky enough to score a tee time, golf clubs will be thrown into the trunk and wheels will hit the road.

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It’s a familiar story.

“Drove down in the morning, took me just a couple of hours to get there. Played 18, had lunch, and hit the road to come back.”

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Sounds like any excited Canadian golfer, but this is far from a regular story, and that’s not just any Canadian golfer.

Let’s rewind.

“Actually drove down to Augusta yesterday and played a round, got a feel for the course,” Mackenzie Hughes told me over the phone on Thursday. “I wanted to get a look at it before the tournament.”

Hughes along with fellow Canadians Corey Conners and 2003 champion Mike Weir will represent the maple leaf at Augusta National this coming week at the season’s first major.

It will be the second Masters tournament for Hughes, who missed the cut in his first go-round in 2017. Conners will be making his fourth start, after finishing tied for 10th at last year’s November edition. Weir, who has a lifetime invitation to Champions Dinners, will be making his 22nd start.

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“My game’s in a pretty good spot so I want to keep it sharp for next week but I’m not trying to work myself too hard because next week is going to take a lot of energy,” Hughes said.

Coming off an impressive tie for ninth at the WGC Dell Match Play, the 30-year-old Dundas, Ont. native took a couple days off back home in Charlotte, N.C., before heading to Augusta National for the practice round with his former Kent State coach Herb Page.

“It was a perfect day,” Hughes said. “Warm and with a little breeze, it was pretty awesome.”

Coach Page agreed with that assessment.

The Canadian Golf Hall of Fame member from Markham, Ont. coached a Kent State golf team that from 2010-12 included Hughes, Conners, and soon-to-be PGA Tour player Taylor Pendrith. In 2019, after 41 years at the helm, Page handed the reins of the Golden Flashes to another Canadian, Jon Mills.

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“I’ve been in golf all my life, I’ve been to five or six Masters, but to walk there with no grandstands, no spectators, I saw views of Augusta that were just spectacular,” Page, 70, said over the phone shortly after returning to his home in Ohio. “It was like a dream for me. It was more than a bucket list, it was just one of the better days of my life.”

The first instruction from his old coach, who he still chats or texts with most weeks, came very early in the day, in fact, it came on Magnolia Lane.

“We’re driving up and I said, ‘Mac, slow down,’ and we’re just soaking it in,” Page said. “I got a great picture of Mac with his thumbs up and it’s just so special, priceless. I’ve got goosebumps.”

The Canadian pair joined up with American PGA Tour player Brendon Todd and his coach and found a course that was firm and getting fast and, once again ready for it’s April close-up.

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“It was just a practice round but he was spectacular,” Page said of Hughes. “Afterwards I just said, ‘Mac, just keep doing what you’re doing. Some of the shots he hit out there, he almost holed out a couple of times with an 8-iron and a 9-iron.”

The plan was to play a round and get some practice in, but the allure and history of Augusta National proved too much. Golf at the highest level is a grind, and for Hughes, on a perfect day, at the perfect golf course with an old friend, it was time to smell the azaleas.

“I definitely stopped to appreciate it,” Hughes said. “I did some things that maybe some guys wouldn’t do. I went for a little tour of the clubhouse again, I hadn’t seen it for a while. I like looking at some of the older memorabilia they have. Whether it’s pictures of Eisenhower or Ben Hogan or Jack, looking at those things is cool for me. I went in the Champion’s locker room and was checking out some of that stuff and it was really cool. I’m one of those guys who stops to appreciate things and where I’m at and the courses I get to play.”

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There would be no time for a sneak peek of Augusta for Hughes’ former Kent State teammate Conners. While Hughes was road-tripping with their old coach, Conners was at TPC San Antonio making his delayed debut as a PGA Tour defending champion at the Valero Texas Open, where he will enter Sunday tied for 17th after shooting a five-under 67 on Saturday.

“It’s been great being back here the last few days, being out on the golf course and reminiscing on all the good shots that I hit, good putts that I holed,” Conners, 29, said Tuesday before the tournament.

The obligations and notoriety of returning to a tournament as defending champ can be surprising, as Conners experienced when he found his smiling face on every key card at the tournament hotel.

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“Definitely an unusual thing,” Conners said. “I said something to the receptionist or the lady that was checking me in. Of course, she had no idea who I was.”

It’s been a busy spring for Conners and Hughes, but neither would have it any other way. The Ontario pair are Canada’s top golfers with Conners ranked 41st in the world, and Hughes 50th. Both players have earned their way into the tour’s marquee events including Invitationals, WGCs, the Players Championship, and now, the season’s opening major.

“I’m definitely prepared to play in the Masters this year,” Conners said. “Yeah, I think my game’s gotten a little more polished over the last few years, a little more consistent. I’ve always known the good stuff was really good and was in there and proved that winning the tournament two years ago, but I would say my level of consistency has definitely improved. I’ve made improvements on certain parts of my game, particularly the short game where I have a lot more confidence around and on the greens.”

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Conners will head to Augusta after the Valero wraps up, and Hughes plans to drive down on Sunday. The pair has plans to join Weir for an all-Canadian practice round Tuesday on the hallowed grounds. If history repeats itself, Weir should be ready to answer some questions. In 2004 at Glen Abbey, a teenage Hughes was caddying in the Canadian Open pro-am and landed a plum spot in the group with the recent green jacket winner and proceeded to pepper him with questions all day, something that might not change this week.

“I’ll be that same 13-year-old kid in his ear all day,” Hughes said. “Trying to learn as much as possible in the time I have with him. He’s been great in that sense, very willing to help. When I sit back and really think about it it’s really cool that Mike Weir is someone I can kind of confide in and ask for advice and talk to.”

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Weir has never stopped working on his game, and after making the cut at the Masters last year for the first time since 2014 he seems on the cusp of a resurgence on the Champions Tour. Canada’s only men’s major winner appreciates his mentor status but as one of golf’s great grinders he also understands that a player needs to write their own story.

“It’s super humbling to think that maybe I inspired guys to think, ‘Hey, if Mike can make it from Sarnia, not a big guy, didn’t hit it far, yet was able to accomplish some pretty cool things, maybe I can do it, too,” Weir told Postmedia in 2019. “It’s more than humbling, but for me, I want those guys to carve their own path. If there’s anyway I can help, I’m there for them.”

Weir, Hughes, and Conners certainly are an unexpected trio to walk down the fairways at Augusta. From Brights Grove to a Masters champion, Weir’s small-town story is legend to Canadian golf fans. Now 50, Weir’s career began quietly with six years zig-zagging across mini tours driving beat-up cars. His eventual success paved the way for later generations who enjoyed more opportunity but equally slim chances in an ever-more-competitive golf world.

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“Listen these guys are from Listowel and Dundas, Ontario,” Page said of Conners and Hughes. “So anything I’m ever trying to do for them is get their confidence up, make them feel good about themselves, and remind them that you are your best coach. I know what happens when you get out on tour and there’s lots of people around.”

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Conners’ small town ties remain strong. He met his wife Malory in the town of 7,500 when she lived next door to his grandparents, and members and staff at Listowel Golf Club remain his biggest supporters. The golf club’s Twitter bio offers proof: “27 Holes of great golf, a terrific restaurant, great people & the headquarters for the Corey Conners fan club!”

Hughes grew up at Dundas Valley Golf and Curling Club, a Stanley Thompson designed course outside of Hamilton. After spending a perfect day at Augusta National with Page it was perhaps unfair to ask Hughes where his favourite spot in the golf world was, but his thoughts managed to make their way back home.

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“It would be easy to say Augusta, it obviously gives you goosebumps,” Hughes said. “But when I go home to Dundas Valley I’m always reminded of just where I started and you know it’s kind of cool to go back to that place and think about ‘oh this is where it all began for me. This is where I was 12 years old and trying to break 80 for the first time, and then break 70. So when I go back and see familiar faces it’s pretty cool for me. It’s always been a good place to me and love getting back there. I’m overdue for a round.”

In Hughes’ defence, it hasn’t been the best year to travel. Plus, last season went long as he made it all the way to the Tour Championship, finishing 14th in the final FedEx Cup standings earning him a spot in the Masters.

Both Hughes and Conners have turned heads outside of Canada with their game recently. Many of Hughes best results have been on his biggest stages: Top tens finishes in two of the the three PGA Tour playoff events, at Jack Nicklaus’ Memorial Tournament, and two weeks ago at the WGC Match Play. His ability to make long putts is impossible to ignore and has garnered him more broadcast time than Canadians are used to seeing.

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“Mackenzie Hughes has made the biggest turnaround into a positive attitude of anybody I’ve ever coached; it’s just such a great thing to see and I’m really really proud of him,” Page said. “Man, that guy can chip and putt and wedge it like nobody. And Corey the ball striker, what else can I say?”

Conners recently has gotten the attention of golf analysts, as well as 2022 Presidents Cup International captain Trevor Immelman, with his beautifully rhythmic and repeatable swing.

Both players will be battling for spots in the Presidents Cup as well as spots at the Olympics in Japan this summer. Fellow Canadians Adam Hadwin and Nick Taylor will be intent on working their way back into both conversations.

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This week, though, nobody is looking past the Masters.

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Conners is bringing an improved putting stroke, a few new short game tricks he has been working on with coach Derek Ingram, and the experience gained from last year’s top-10 finish at Augusta.

“I feel like I have a great plan for the golf course and feel like my game sets up pretty well,” Conners said. “Work the ball right to left off the tee, I think a lot of the holes fit my eye with that shot shape. Then typically being a strong iron player, that’s the important part of success there. And then putting as well, I became more comfortable on the greens and switched to a new putting style the end of last summer and been working really hard on that and starting to build a lot of confidence.”

Hughes is coming off a match play week that further proved to himself that he can beat the best in the world, and says he’s ready to make the next step.

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“I still have limited major experience but I really do feel like my game stacks up against the best players in the world now, and it’s time for me to show that and not just believe it and say it,” Hughes said. “But I do feel like if I play the way I know I can play and have a great week there is no reason why it couldn’t be me.”

As for Coach Page, after his day in the sun with Hughes, he will be making a return trip to Augusta National, this time courtesy of Conners.

“They just treat me with such respect and dignity,” Page said. “A lot of people just move on, and they have, but they kept me in their loop and their loyalty is through the roof.”

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