After more than two decades playing in the American Century Championship, Tim Brown finally got his ace.
The longtime Raiders wide receiver and NFL Hall of Famer walked off Edgewood Tahoe Resort in Nevada with a brand new boat because of it, too.
Brown rolled in his tee shot at the 143-yard par-3 12th straight into the cup on Friday afternoon in the second round of the annual celebrity golf tournament, which sparked a huge celebration on the tee box with playing partners and fellow former NFL players Marcus Allen and Jerome Bettis.
Because he hit the first hole-in-one at the 12th, Brown walked away with the MasterCraft boat that was sitting right behind him on the tee.
“I didn’t hit it the way I wanted to,” Brown said. “I was trying to hit it up to the right and I pulled it a little bit. I was starting to complain and noticed the ball was going at the hole. Of course I didn’t think it was going to go in. But then the crowd up there went crazy, and I didn’t even know about the boat.”
The ace was the fifth of Brown’s career. He hit one at Augusta National on the par-3 course earlier this year, and he’s hit one at the famous island green at TPC Sawgrass.
This was Brown’s 24th appearance at the ACC. He finished Friday with 17 points, which was good for eighth at the time.
“I thought it was going to be short. All of a sudden you saw the people up there go nuts, and so it was sort of delayed reaction for us because we couldn’t see the ball go in the hole,” Brown said. “But it’s quite the moment. It’s one of those things you dream about, but everything is going to happen. So it was great.”
Brown, who won the Heisman Trophy at Notre Dame in 1987, was selected by the Raiders with the No. 6 overall pick in 1988. He spent 16 seasons with the franchise before spending his final year in the league with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2004. Brown finished with 14,934 yards, which is the seventh-most all-time, and 100 touchdowns. Brown had nine consecutive seasons with at least 1,000 receiving yards, too, which is a mark only Jerry Rice and Mike Evans have surpassed. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2015.