Georgia teen Mason Howell won the U.S. Amateur. Now he's back in class.

After his victory at the 125th U.S. Amateur Championship last weekend, Mason Howell is exempt from a lot of things. School isn’t one of them.

He returned Wednesday morning to the Brookwood School, a small private school in Thomasville (there are only 45 kids in his graduating class), less than 72 hours after he won the ultimate championship in amateur golf.

First class: Marine biology at 8 a.m. It’s a class that he doesn’t particularly enjoy, but since it’s taught by a teacher he likes, it’s worth the effort. And while it didn’t have the allure of San Francisco and while the school menu didn’t feature the Olympic Club’s signature hamburger dogs, Howell knew he had to suck it up and get back to school.

“I’ve missed a lot of class, and I don’t want to fall behind,” he said.

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Credit: Chris Keane/USGA

Credit: Chris Keane/USGA

Howell didn’t fall behind in the U.S. Amateur championship match Sunday. He had a 4-up lead on Tennessean Jackson Herrington after the morning round of the 36-hole final, then kept his foot on the gas pedal in the afternoon to secure a 7 and 6 victory. It was the most lopsided U.S. Amateur final since Bryson DeChambeau won by the same score in 2015.

At age 18 years, one month and 20 days, he became the third youngest winner in tournament history. Only Danny Lee (18 years, one month in 2008) and Ben An (17 years, 11 months, 13 days in 2009) were younger. Bobby Jones waited until he was 22.

Howell became the third Georgian to win the U.S. Amateur. He joins Steve Melnyk of Brunswick, who won the U.S. Amateur and the British Am in 1969, and Jones, who won the U.S. Amateur a record five teams.

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Although the championship was on the other side of the continent, Howell was as comfortable as possible. His parents, Robb and Lauren Howell, were at the tournament all week. (Sister Megan, a member of the University of Georgia athletic training staff, couldn’t make it, although Howell gave her a pass since she had flown in from Paris last summer to surprise him when he played at the U.S. Open at Oakmont.) Jimmy Gillam, a staff member at Glen Arven Country Club in Thomasville and the Brookwood coach, was on the bag, just as he had been at Oakmont.

Bill Connally, the PGA director of golf at Glen Arven, waited until the final day. He took the red eye to California and arrived at the course on the fourth hole of the morning round. He found Howell relaxed and confident, despite the enormous pressure.

“I didn’t want to jinx him,” said Connally, who has worked with Howell since he was old enough to swing a golf club. “But he was so loose. He came up and started talking to me on the 18th tee, and he wasn’t nervous at all.”

Credit: Chris Keane/USGA

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The nerves weren’t obvious to Connally, the gallery or the TV audience, but Howell said it felt different in his skin.

“Oh, the nerves were there,” Howell said. “But a big part of match play is to not show them. If you’re not careful you can get caught up in the moment.”

That didn’t happen all week. Howell needed to survive a 20-for-17 playoff just to reach the match-play portion of the championship and began play as the 63rd seed. He needed 19 holes to defeat No. 2 seed Tommy Morrison in the first round and played with confidence the rest of the week. Only one other 63rd seed had reached the final.

Howell had been trending in the right direction all summer. He was the youngest player to qualify for the U.S. Open at Oakmont and used the experience to push his game forward. That’s where he played two practice rounds with Harris English, a Glen Arven member and a five-time PGA Tour winner. English, who played golf at UGA, was aware of Howell but didn’t know the depths of his talents until then.

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“I was blown away about how good his game was and how he handled himself,” English said. “He wasn’t afraid of the moment, and he was preparing that week like he was trying to win the U.S. Open. That blew me away because if I put myself in my shoes when I was 17 or 18, I’m pretty star struck, my head is spinning, I don’t know what I’m doing. He had a plan, and he carried himself like he was a 10-year veteran.”

After winning the championship, Howell and his growing entourage returned to their rental house and celebrated for a few hours, then drove to the airport for the flight home. He used the downtime to return an estimated 700 messages, among them congratulatory texts from English, Sepp Straka and Georgia coach Chris Haack, who has a strong verbal commitment from Howell to join the team in 2026. He even got a text from Gov. Brian Kemp.

Now Howell must return to the regular lifestyle of an 18-year-old high school senior. The invitation to the 2026 Masters, the 2026 U.S. Open, the 2026 Open Championship and the next 10 U.S. Amateurs.