Sam makes a 9 on the 7th: two tee shots out of bounds and a three-putt. Chris makes a routine 4 and assumes the afternoon is settled. It isn’t. Sam wins the match on the 17th green, and Chris walks off the 18th with the lower score by two. Neither of them added anything up wrong. They played the same eighteen holes under two different questions, and only one of those questions was agreed on the first tee.
Two formats, two questions
In match play you play against an opponent, one hole at a time. Fewer strokes wins the hole; the same number halves it. The match ends as soon as one side is ahead by more holes than are left to play. That is Rule 3.2 of the Rules of Golf.
In stroke play, every stroke on every hole counts, penalty strokes included, and the lowest total wins. In a real stroke-play competition you hole out on every hole, however it is going. That is Rule 3.3. A 9 is a 9, and it stays on the card all afternoon.
One invented card, two winners
This is an invented round between two players of similar ability, played gross, with no handicap strokes. It isn’t a real course, an app screenshot or anyone’s recorded score. The last column is the match standing after each hole.
| Hole | Par | Sam | Chris | Hole won by | Match after the hole |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | 5 | 5 | Halved | All square |
| 2 | 4 | 4 | 5 | Sam | Sam 1 up |
| 3 | 3 | 3 | 4 | Sam | Sam 2 up |
| 4 | 5 | 6 | 6 | Halved | Sam 2 up |
| 5 | 4 | 5 | 4 | Chris | Sam 1 up |
| 6 | 3 | 4 | 4 | Halved | Sam 1 up |
| 7 | 4 | 9 | 4 | Chris | All square |
| 8 | 4 | 5 | 5 | Halved | All square |
| 9 | 5 | 5 | 6 | Sam | Sam 1 up |
| Out | 36 | 46 | 43 | — | — |
| 10 | 4 | 5 | 5 | Halved | Sam 1 up |
| 11 | 5 | 5 | 6 | Sam | Sam 2 up |
| 12 | 3 | 4 | 3 | Chris | Sam 1 up |
| 13 | 4 | 4 | 5 | Sam | Sam 2 up |
| 14 | 4 | 5 | 5 | Halved | Sam 2 up |
| 15 | 4 | 5 | 4 | Chris | Sam 1 up |
| 16 | 3 | 3 | 4 | Sam | Sam 2 up |
| 17 | 5 | 6 | 6 | Halved | Sam wins, 2 and 1 |
| 18 | 4 | 5 | 5 | — | Match already over |
| In | 36 | 42 | 43 | — | — |
| Total | 72 | 88 | 86 | — | — |
Stroke play: Chris wins, 86 to 88. Match play: Sam won six holes, Chris won four and seven were halved; the 18th wasn’t needed. After the 17th Sam is two up with one to play, so the match is over: Sam wins 2 and 1. The 18th still counts for the stroke-play total, so they play it anyway.
Look at the front nine alone. Chris is three strokes better and one hole down. Sam won three holes by a stroke each, lost the 5th by one and the 7th by five. In stroke play that is three strokes the wrong way. In match play it is three holes against two.
What the 9 on the 7th actually cost
In stroke play, Sam’s 9 cost five strokes against Chris’s 4. Over the other seventeen holes Sam was a stroke better six times and a stroke worse three times, which wins back three of the five. That is the whole stroke-play result: Chris by two.
In match play, the same 9 cost exactly one hole. Once the second tee shot went out of bounds, Sam could have conceded the hole and walked to the 8th; Rule 3.2b lets a player concede a hole at any time. The extra strokes don’t follow Sam anywhere, because match play doesn’t keep them. The exception is a stroke-play game running alongside, like the one at the end of this post: then every hole needs a score, and Sam plays the 7th out.
Match play asks who won the hole. Stroke play asks what it cost.
Which argument does your group want?
Size matters. Match play is between two sides, so a foursome either pairs off or plays two against two. Stroke play ranks any number of players in one list. A foursome that wants a single winner, and no pairings to keep track of, is asking for stroke play whether it uses the name or not.
Which GoLo game asks which question
For match play, use the Nassau, three matches in one round, or the Overall Match, one match over all eighteen holes, which is the game that takes presses in GoLo. Without teams, both are played head to head, and with three or four players every pair has its own match. With four players, Team Play makes it two against two on each team’s better score.
For stroke play, use Best Score. Everyone puts in the same amount, the lowest total takes it, net or gross as agreed, with one finishing place or more and ties split evenly. One scorer enters the gross scores; GoLo applies the handicap strokes and works out every game from the same card.
Run the invented card above through both. A $2 Nassau goes to Sam three times: one up on the front, one up on the back after winning the 11th, 13th and 16th and losing the 12th and 15th, and the overall match. Sam is $6 up. A $5 Best Score, gross, one finishing place, goes to Chris, who is $5 up. Play both and the afternoon nets to Chris paying Sam a dollar.
Skins asks a third question: the lowest score on each hole, against the whole group. If that’s the comparison your foursome is really making, skins against a Nassau is the post for it.
Say the format in the same sentence as the amount
“Two-dollar Nassau, gross, no presses” is match play. “Five dollars each, Best Score, gross, low total takes it” is stroke play. Either sentence is clear before the first tee shot. “Let’s play for five” is clear to nobody, and the person who makes the 9 on the 7th will remember it whichever way suits them.
Agree the question, then see one round go from setup to settle-up or get GoLo for the next one. GoLo keeps the tally; the money moves outside the app.
