Andrew Mason, Jeremy Wall ready for Philadelphia Amateur title duel

By Saturday's end, there will be a new name inscribed on the J. Wood Platt Trophy.

The BMW Philadelphia Amateur will conclude with a 36-hole championship match between Huntingdon Valley's Andrew Mason and Manasquan River's Jeremy Wall at the par-72, 6,883-yard Whitemarsh Valley Country Club. Neither player has appeared in the final before — Mason made the semifinals in 2011 before turning pro, and Wall's club joined the Golf Association of Philadelphia only at the start of 2017.

After playing nearly a combined 200 holes of golf in the span of three days, the pair has Friday to refuel, or in Mason's case, go back to work before returning to the course at 7 a.m. Saturday, when things will begin.

"I'm really, really tired," Mason, 29, said with a laugh after Thursday's semifinal win. "I wasn't expecting to be here by any stretch of the imagination, so it's going to be fun. … [But] I've got to go rest up."

Wall, a Brielle, N.J., native and a recent graduate of Loyola (Md.) University, was one of three players 22 years old and younger to knock off a stalwart and advance to the semifinals. With a 4-and-3 victory against Temple junior Marty McGuckin, Wall, 22, became the youth movement's lone representative in the title match.

"The goal is to make match play like it is for everyone," he said Thursday. "Once I made match play, it was just take each match as it presents itself and try to win it."

With the Greyhounds, Wall earned second-team all-Patriot League honors in his final season, finishing 10th in the conference tournament in April. But he's really hit his stride at this event — Wall's 8-and-7 win against 2017 Philadelphia Open champ Matt Mattare was as lopsided as any match at Whitemarsh all week.

"Everybody comes and wants their name on these trophies," Wall said. "It would be a great honor to win."