CALEDON, Ont. — Not for the first time on the back nine on Sunday, Matthew Anderson found himself in a pickle.
His drive on the 504-yard par-4 16th went right. Well right. He knew it as soon as he finished his follow-through, and as he watched his ball treat the fairway like a no-fly zone, he doubled over as if he’d just been punched in the gut.
In some ways, he had been. Although, to be fair, it wasn’t anything the North Course at TPC Toronto at Osprey Valley had out for him personally during the final round of the RBC Canadian Open.
The rules for success over the past two years at Osprey Valley are fairly simple to follow: keep your tee shot on short grass, and you have a good chance to score at the 7,389-yard par 70 layout, which was hosting the Open for the second consecutive year and will again in 2027.
There were 10 Canadian entrants who solved the riddle well enough to play through the weekend.
The most successful among them was Sudarshan Yellamaraju, who continued his impressive rookie season on the PGA Tour by firing a final-round 68 that earned him low Canadian honours and, more significantly, a tie for eighth place at 12-under, five shots behind winner Bud Cauley. It’s the self-taught Mississauga golfer’s third top-10 finish of the season.
The most surprising was one of Anderson’s playing partners, Justin Matthews, the 22-year-old amateur from Little Britain, Ont., about 125 kilometres east. The lone amateur to make the cut, the senior at the University of North Carolina Charlotte found himself tied for fifth at 12-under after making birdie on the 15th hole.
A triple bogey on the 17th and a bogey on the 18th dropped him to 29th place at 8-under, tied with fellow Canadians and PGA Tour regulars Taylor Pendrith and AJ Ewart, and ahead of the likes of former Canadian Open champion Nick Taylor (even par, T65).
A confidence builder, to be sure. “I honestly felt really comfortable out there,” said Matthews, who was playing in his second Canadian Open and made the cut for the first time. “I had nothing to lose this week playing as an amateur, I can't earn any money and it's not as high stakes for me compared to some of the other guys, some of the professionals. I was just really trying to enjoy the moment. I had nothing to lose today; I just had a lot of fun.”
The stakes are higher for someone like Anderson, the 26-year-old from nearby Mississauga who normally plays on the Korn Ferry Tour but played here this week on a sponsor’s exemption. He played in the same group as Matthews.
Anderson had started his day by making six birdies on the front nine, aided by following the formula for success at the North course: finding the fairway — or at least the first cut of rough — on every tee shot, and avoiding the deep rough wide of the fairways made even more challenging by the steady rain that had fallen early in the afternoon.
The result was a dream run to his first PGA Tour start of the season and a performance made all the more remarkable because he’d missed his last five cuts on the Korn Ferry Tour, which is a notch below.
A big weekend at his home open could not only deliver some welcome cash, but more importantly, an opportunity to qualify for the British Open or — with a top 10 finish — earn his way into the next full field Tour event.
And he was doing it. A 332-yard drive on the 491-yard par four ninth left him with just 165 yards in. He hit the middle of the elevated green and celebrated his 31-foot birdie putt with a subtle fist pump.
For the moment, he was at -14 and leading the tournament. There was a giant leaderboard just off the ninth green that was hard not to see, holding information it was hard not to think about.
“You definitely feel the juices,” said Anderson, whose only professional win came on the PGA Tour Americas in 2024. “Thoughts come in your head, like, ‘Hey, it's my national open, I'm tied for the lead, that's awesome’. And then we redirect the focus and try and make a good swing.”
But the focus wasn’t ideally redirected. After being in what he described as a ‘flow state’ on the front nine, Anderson found himself in a battle on the back. There was a tee shot pulled out of bounds on the 10th that led to a double bogey, another on that he cut too far to the right on the par-3 11th that very nearly got wet and needed a delicate up-and-down to save par, a couple of missed birdie chances on 14 and 15 and now another tee shot on the 16th hole that the right hander shoved so far off line that it looked like a disaster, especially when the provisional ball he hit missed the fairway too.
But sometimes being lucky can make up for a lot. Anderson found his first ball, which was so far right it was actually in a reasonable position to make a play from, although it was sitting in about 12 inches of rough, well below his feet. After some discussion with his caddie, he decided to try to shape a left-to-right shot that he hoped would leave him in a good position short of the green to save his par. Instead, it didn’t fade, leaving him a difficult up-and-down from behind a greenside bunker that he couldn’t convert. He was now three over par on his back nine.
His troubles weren’t over. On the 17th hole, another drive went well right and this time he had to take a one-shot penalty. After taking his drop, he flushed a 7-iron from 189 yards out and off the fairway to pin high, about 30 feet right. A remarkable shot followed up by a remarkable putt to save bogey.
But the damage was done: any chance of earning a spot in the British Open by finishing among the top three of players not already qualified was gone, and he needed a birdie on the par-five 18th hole to finish in the top 10 and get another precious PGA Tour start. But that didn’t happen either as he had to lay-up after another drive that drifted right and he couldn’t get up-and-down for the necessary birdie.
It wasn’t the end he was hoping for after standing on the 10th tee with the lead. But golf rarely works out that way.
Instead, he can find solace in the biggest payday of his career — the $218,050 cheque the largest of his career and nearly matching his career winnings to this point.
And also in the knowledge that at his best, his game is good enough to compete with the best.
"I mean, if I didn't believe it before, I absolutely know that I can win out here,” Anderson said. “I proved that to myself. I went out, I did my process, I did as best I could, the one swing on 16 … that may be the only one I would take back.
“But I would rather be in there in the mix and not have it go my way than not have that at all. The stuff that you learn from feeling those feelings and trying to manage your emotions and focus on what you need to focus on is like more valuable than anything. So I'm obviously grateful for that. It wasn't my time today, but it will be my time soon, and that's fine.”
