Harry Fodder: Gilliam Shared Belief in Fate

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Mere moments after Ricky Castillo drained his pressure-packed, mega-clutch, match-clinching birdie putt to win his NCAA Championships semifinal marathon Tuesday night against Florida State, Nick Gilliam, one of the greatest golfers in Gators’ history, texted a short video to a group chat reserved for a handful of local UF faithful.

This video. 

J.C. Deacon was included on that text blast, but the Florida coach likely didn’t need to be reminded of Ben Crenshaw’s classic sound byte from the United States’s stunning comeback victory to defeat Europe in the 1999 Ryder Cup. He’d just witnessed live one of the great rallies in UF sports lore, with his team coming from two points down with six holes to play for a 3-2 victory in the program’s first crack at the match-play championship format the NCAA implemented in 2009. 

Second-seeded Florida will face fifth-seeded Georgia Tech for the national title Wednesday, beginning at 4:35 p.m. at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. The Gators will be seeking their fifth NCAA championship in program history and first since 2001 when Gilliam not only led the team to the crown but also claimed the individual championship. 

On Monday, Gilliam was glued to the Golf Channel as fifth-year senior Fred Biondi clawed from two strokes down with three holes to play to beat Tech’s Ross Steelman and become UF’s first individual champ since Gilliam 22 years ago (and just the third in program history, along with Bob Murphy in 1966). On Tuesday, Gilliam again was riveted to the tube as three Gators — first Biondi, then John DuBois, then Castillo on his 39th hole of the day and third of sudden death — wiped out the Seminoles’ two-point lead with jaw-dropping rallies, culminated by Castillo’s 16-foot birdie to defeat FSU’s Brett Roberts 1-up for the decisive point. 

“As a former individual champion on a team that won it that same year, the team was always more important to me. It just was,” Gilliam said. “So to see Ricky make that putt, to bury it for his teammates, that was an emotional moment for me … and I’m not even in the program.” 

 

Oh, but he’s certainly a big part of the program’s rich tradition that dates to 1925 and includes 16 Southeastern Conference championships, including the 2023 crown, and four NCAA titles (1968, ’73, ’93 and 2001). The Gators will try to take that latter number to five in…