OGDEN — Cole Ponich is one-for-one.
The former BYU golfer survived the cut in his first start on the Korn Ferry Tour as a professional, shooting 3-under-par 67 Friday for a tie for 12th at the Utah Championship at Ogden Golf and Country Club.
It’s just the third professional start for Ponich, who won the Provo Open a month ago in his pro debut and finished in the top 15 of the Colorado Open prior to teeing up at the site where he won the Utah state amateur championship a year ago.
Ponich averaged a 329-yard drive in his first 36 holes on the Korn Ferry Tour, but he’ll putt for dough after finishing in the top 15 for putts per greens in regulation of 1.63.
The former junior All-American from Davis High who previously played the Utah Championship at Oakridge was lethal from short, playing the par-3s at 3-under before taking a bogey on the par-3, 177-yard 16th hole — or the seventh hole as it normally plays for members in Ogden.
“I feel like I rolled it really well, and have been the last two days,” Ponich told KSL.com. “I hit some great shots into the first three par-3s, and made some really good putts,” that included a 35-foot birdie putt at No. 11.
Ponich is tied at 7-under with Preston Summerhays, the former two-time Utah state amateur champion who recently turned pro out of Arizona State.
The duo are just one stroke behind former Weber High star — and longtime Ogden Golf and Country Club member — Connor Howe, as well as Daniel Summerhays, the former BYU golf standout who shot a blistering 7-under 63 to shoot up to a tie for eighth at 8-under.
More impressive than Summerhays’ two-day total of 132 is that he did it with a surgically repaired back.
The 41-year-old golfer who has played professionally since 2007 had back surgery in January, when doctors fused his L3 and L4 vertebrae. Initially, his rehab included Sunday walks with his dog and wife Emily, when they’d get 20 yards down the road before he’d stop to recover.
But through work with his team of doctors, physical therapists, athletic trainer and family, the two-time Utah state amateur champion returned three weeks ago at The Ascendant in Colorado, played all four rounds in a Korn Ferry Tour event a week later in Missouri, and shot 63-69 in climbing as high as a tie for sixth in his home state.
“It’s been kind of miraculous, honestly,” Summerhays quipped. “The first few months were really difficult, but I worked my tail off to get back into shape.”
So what was working so well Friday that Summerhays wasn’t doing in Thursday’s opening round? The same thing as Ponich.
“The putting was way better,” he said. “I have a little putting green in my basement at my house and we spent about an hour down there with my wife and … my two youngest kids, and we putted till probably 9:30 last night just putting, putting, putting.
“I was adding a little too much loft on the putter,” he added. “I just figured that out and rolled the rock really nice today, honestly. I hit some really nice putts.”
Contending in his third event back from back surgery 👀
Daniel Summerhays had his L3 and L4 vertebrae fused in January and now sits inside the top 10 in his home event. pic.twitter.com/YPPZSFv1yE
— Korn Ferry Tour (@KornFerryTour) August 1, 2025
Taylor Montgomery climbed into the lead of the 72-hole event at 14-under, carding 6-under 64 to take a two-shot lead into Saturday’s moving day.
Playing with Daniel Summerhays, the former two-time Sand Hollow Open champion from Las Vegas carded seven birdies with one bogey that included a run of four consecutive holes under par on the front nine.
“Golf is over four days, so it’s such a long process,” said Montgomery, who joked he went fishing Wednesday “instead of a practice round” in one of his many visits to the Beehive State. “When you play basketball, you play for an hour or two, and then mentally it’s kind of over and you move on to the next game.
“In golf, you can have three bad holes and it’ll just wipe you right out of the tournament.”
Former University of Utah golfer Mitchell Schow, who claims Ogden as his hometown, shot 71-66 for a two-day total of 3-under 137. That’s tied on the cut line with former BYU golfer Peter Kuest, who fired a 3-under 67 Friday.
BYU incoming freshman Kihei Akina, playing as an amateur in his second-straight Utah Championship, shot 68 to finish at 1-under 139. Salt Lake City’s Hayden Banz, a 2024 graduate of Weber State, finished at 1-over 141 and also missed the cut.
Select tee times for Saturday’s third round at the Utah Championship at Ogden Golf and Country Club8:35 a.m. MDT — Peter Kuest, former BYU golfer8:55 a.m. MDT — Mitchell Schow, former Utah golfer1 p.m. MDT — Cole Ponich, former BYU golfer1:40 p.m. MDT — Preston Summerhays, former Utah state amateur champion2:10 p.m. MDT — Daniel Summerhays, former BYU golfer; Connor Howe, former Weber High golfer
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.