The Missouri State Amateur Championship moved into the Match Play portion of the event on Thursday as the top 64 players from the qualifying rounds went head to head.  Six past champions advanced to Match Play, Skip Berkmeyer, Don Bliss, Jim Holtgrieve and defending champion Conner McHenry all advanced while Scott Thomas and Wayne Fredrick did not win their matches to advance to the round of 32.  Even though Wayne Fredrick did not advance he will be around for the 2nd round as son, Nathan advanced easily and is expecting Wayne to be on the bag for him Friday morning.

In addition to the past champions moving on, two players to watch include St. Louis' Darren Lundgren who advanced winning 7 & 6 and the 2007 runner up Mitchell Gregson who also won convincingly, 8 & 6 in round one.  Host club, WingHaven Country Club, had three members advance to match play, Scott McClellan, Chad Hull and Kyle Jasper, but only Jasper won his match and advanced to the 2nd round. 

Players were very complimentary of the course set up over the first three days as the common sentiment was that the course played tough, but fair.  WingHaven features plenty of length and difficult thick rough, but the dry and calm conditions allowed players that were driving the ball particularly well to be more aggressive and throw in a few birdies.

Second round matches begin Friday morning at 7:30 and the 16 winners of the morning matches will tee it up beginning at 1:00 p.m. to reduce the field down to just 8 players after play is completed.