Jack Whaley, a 22-year-old Florida State golfer from Doncaster, England, won the 126th U.S. Amateur Championship on Sunday at Merion Golf Club, becoming just the third Englishman in the tournament's 126-year history to lift the Havemeyer Trophy.

Whaley, seeded No. 60 entering match play, erased a 2-down deficit after the morning 18 holes to beat Jay Leng Jr. 4 and 3 in Sunday's 36-hole championship match, according to ESPN. The win makes him the first Florida State player to capture the U.S. Amateur in program history and the first Seminole to reach the final since Drew Kittleson in 2008.

Whaley joins a short list of Englishmen to win the event — Harold Hilton in 1910 and Matt Fitzpatrick in 2013 are the only others — a rarity in a championship long dominated by American players, per Golf Channel.

THE FIRST SEMINOLE TO WIN THE HAVEMEYER TROPHY.

A Ticket to Golf's Biggest Stages

The victory comes with immediate, tangible rewards. Whaley is now exempt into the 127th U.S. Open next June at Pebble Beach Golf Links, and is expected to receive invitations to the 2027 Masters Tournament and a spot in the 2027 Open Championship at St. Andrews' Old Course — three of the sport's four majors, all before he turns professional, according to 247Sports.

Merion Golf Club, the historic Ardmore, Pennsylvania course that hosted Ben Hogan's famous 1950 U.S. Open comeback, provided the backdrop for the week-long championship, which began with 312 golfers in stroke-play qualifying before cutting to a 64-player match-play bracket.

Whaley's run through the bracket culminated in Sunday's come-from-behind final, a result that instantly reshapes his amateur golf legacy and gives Florida State's program a milestone it had never previously achieved. His performance also adds to a strong recent stretch for English amateurs and pros alike on the world stage, following Fitzpatrick's rise from U.S. Amateur champion to major winner a decade ago — a trajectory Whaley will now be measured against as he weighs his own path to professional golf.