PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Golf Channel’s broadcasters called it three-and-a-half feet. Matthew Riedel is adamant it was at least five. It felt like 50 feet as he watched it roll toward the hole.

The final round of a tournament is never easy, least of all when the reward at the end is not a trophy but a job, a career and the realization of a lifelong dream. Riedel figured his putt on the 18th would wiggle a bit right. That’s how he saw it moving when his chip rolled by the pin a little too long for comfort and set up a do-or-die par attempt. Sink it and a TOUR card was his; miss and the dream was on hold for another 12 months. It’s the type of putt every kid dreams of, few actually get to hit and only a handful make.

Riedel can put himself on that list … even if he misread the putt, which somehow slid left but caught the side of the cup and dropped.

“I couldn’t really feel much on those final few shots,” Riedel said. “Just trying to play the shot in front of me and see what happens. By the grace of God, I got away it.”

There are no pictures on a scorecard, much less a TOUR card – which is what Reidel now has. He finished 4-under, tied for fourth at Final Stage of Q-School presented by Korn Ferry. He’s #TOURBound for the 2025 PGA TOUR season, less than six months since he turned professional.

It’s the crescendo of a whirlwind year for the recent Vanderbilt grad. Riedel finished T2 at the SEC Championship in April, turned pro in June, nearly won a Korn Ferry Tour event in July and earned his TOUR card by December. Riedel has long felt a bit underrated, an understandable feeling when playing on a college team with more highly touted amateurs like Gordon Sargent, who became the first player to earn TOUR membership through PGA TOUR University Accelerated program earlier this year.

Riedel can’t be skipped over now.

“From high school on, it was just a clinic,” said Drew Murdoch, Riedel’s caddie and lifelong friend. “Like he'd play in these events with every big name you can imagine. He's right there with them. He wasn't as high profile as some of the other guys, but man, the ball-striking is just unbelievable … I'm not surprised at all. This is where he belongs.”

Riedel finished No. 4 in the 2024 PGA TOUR University Ranking, earning immediate status on the Korn Ferry Tour beginning in June. He played 13 of the next 15 weeks with so-so results. He made about as many cuts (six) as he missed (seven), but he put it all together for a week at The Ascendant presented by Blue. He shot 64-66 on the weekend to finish runner-up to Cristobal Del Solar. That earned him full status on the Korn Ferry Tour for 2025, making this week all about a TOUR card. While others were sweating out a top-45 finish for Korn Ferry Tour starts, Riedel was trained on the top-five. That focus narrowed even further after he co-led after 54 holes. Now he wanted to win.

That set in a whole new level of nerves, even if the increased expectations eventually helped him earn his card.

“Somebody asked (Riedel) on the range if he got much sleep and he said ‘yes,’” said Murdoch. “and then I asked him walking down the first fairway and he was like, ‘no.’”

The start looked as nervy as it felt. Riedel was 3-over through 10 holes and had not only dropped from the lead but from the top five entirely. Murdoch pointed to Reidel’s tee shot on the 11th, a five-iron from 225 yards that settled 20 feet from the hole, as the turning point. Riedel strung together five straight pars before arriving at the par-5 16th. Needing a birdie over the last three holes, Riedel opted to hit iron off the tee, worried about how narrow the landing area was for his driver. Riedel laid up to a comfortable wedge distance and spun his approach to within 2 feet for a tap-in birdie. It wasn’t smooth sailing from there, though. Reidel’s drive on the 17th hole nearly found the water hazard.

“I don’t know how that ball’s up. That ball should not have been up,” Riedel said. He left his approach short of the green, got up and down and headed to 18. The rest is history.

“It means everything,” Riedel said. “Worked really hard for this moment and really proud of myself that coming down the stretch it was tough, I wanted to be tough and I persevered and got through it.”