North Carolina junior Brynn Walker, a two-time PIAA Class
AAA champion at Radnor, used a run of four straight back-nine birdies to fire a
5-under-par 67 at the Hackensack Golf Club in Oradell, N.J. Monday to earn
medalist honors in a qualifier for the U.S. Women’s Amateur.
It was the second straight year that Walker, who plays out
of St. Davids Golf Club, has been the medalist in a U.S. Women’s Amateur
qualifier in the Garden State. A 1-over 72 at Forsgate Country Club’s Banks
Course in Monroe, N.J. a year ago earned her a ticket to San Diego Country
Club.
A case of what sounded an awful lot like food poisoning
derailed Walker’s chances in last year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur in Chula Vista,
Calif. It was a small miracle she was able to complete two rounds of
qualifying, but she failed to earn a spot in match play.
Walker has been in the starting lineup for every tournament
North Carolina has played since she arrived in Chapel Hill in the summer of
2016. It was a disappointing end of the season for the Tar Heels this spring as
they finished ninth in a tough San Francisco Regional and failed to earn a trip
to the NCAA Championship at Karsten Creek Golf Club.
Monday’s sparkling performance should give Walker some
momentum heading into this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur, her third, which tees
off Aug. 6 at The Golf Club of Tennessee in Kingston Springs, Tenn.
“I hit 16 greens and made 28 putts,” Walker told the New
Jersey State Golf Association website. “On my ninth hole, No. 18, I sank a
35-foot downhill putt. Putting has always been the best part of my game.
“The greens rolled really nice and fast today. I always look
forward to coming back north after my college season ends. I love the courses
up here.”
The birdie bomb at nine got Walker to 1-under for her round
after she had birdied the 11th and bogeyed the 16th. Then
she really got it going on her final nine holes, the front nine at Hackensack,
as she rattled off consecutive birdies at five, six, seven and eight.
Joining Walker in Tennessee will be her old scholastic
rival, Penn State senior Jackie Rogowicz, a two-time District One champion at
Pennsbury. Rogowicz carded a 2-under 70 and finished tied for third with
Katherine Zhu, of San Jose, Calif., who will start her college career later
this summer at California.
Rogowicz survived a playoff to earn a trip to Rolling Green
Golf Club for the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur in a qualifier at Hawk Pointe Golf
Club in Washington, N.J. Playing in front of friends and family at Rolling
Green, Rogowicz came up short in a playoff to make match play.
Last month Rogowicz earned a spot in the field of the LPGA
ShopRite Classic, presented by Acer, at the Stockton Seaview Hotel & Golf Club
in a Monday qualifier. Playing in her first LPGA event, Rogowicz struggled in
the opening round with an 83, but bounced back with a solid 72 in the second
round. Rogowicz missed the cut, but gaining that kind of experience is
invaluable and may have already started paying dividends this week at
Hackensack.
The runnerup to Walker was Arizona senior Bianca Pagdanganan
of the Philippines, one of the heroes of the Wildcats’ run to a national
championship this spring. Pagdanganan fired a 4-under 68 to earn herself a spot
in the field at The Golf Club of Tennessee.
Pagdanganan authored one of the more memorable shots in
recent NCAA Championship history when she got a 35-foot downhill slider to fall
into the cup for an eagle on the 18th hole that enabled Arizona to
catch Baylor and force a playoff for the eighth and final seed in the
match-play team competition at Karsten Creek.
The Wildcats won that playoff and proceeded to knock off
Pac-12 rivals UCLA, ranked No. 3 by Golfstat,
and No. 5 Stanford before beating top-ranked Alabama in the Final Match to capture the title. Oh
yeah, and Pagdanganan finished tied for second in the individual chase at
Karsten Creek.
Ina Kim-Schaad, a former Northwestern standout who has
emerged as a solid mid-amateur after putting the sticks away for a decade or so,
outlasted Jennifer Cleary, the talented Tower Hill junior from Wilmington, Del.,
on the sixth hole of what started as a 3-for-1 playoff for the final ticket to
The Golf Club of Tennessee.
Kim-Schaad, Cleary and Harvard-bound Anina Ku of Basking
Ridge, N.J. finished tied for fifth, each posting a 1-under 71. Ku was
eliminated on the first hole of the playoff and is the second alternate.
Kim-Schaad and Cleary battled on on a day when the thermometer hovered around
the 100-degree mark before the
16-year-old Cleary finally had to settle for first-alternate status.
Three of Rogowicz’s teammates on Denise St. Pierre’s Penn
State team were also at Hackensack with fellow senior Cara Basso, the 2012 PIAA
Class AA champion as a sophomore at Villa Maria Academy, coming up a little
short with a 1-over 73.
Basso earned a bid to the NCAA Madison Regional as an
individual after a solid spring for the Nittany Lions that included a tie for fourth
in the Big Ten Championship at TPC River’s Bend in Maineville, Ohio.
Megan McLean, a junior at Penn State who starred
scholastically at Voorhees High, carded a 75. And junior Madelein Herr, the
District One Class AAA champion as a senior at Council Rock North, carded a 79.
Two of the more prominent entries on Walker’s USGA resume
include the two U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championships in which she
teamed with Herr. They reached the semifinals in the inaugural Women’s
Four-Ball at Bandon Dunes in 2015 and made it to the quarterfinals the
following year at Streamsong.
Recent Agnes Irwin graduate Kaitlyn Lees, coming off her
third win in the Pennsylvania Junior Girls’ Championship at Hershey Country
Club’s East Course, had a solid showing with a 2-over 74. The Dartmouth-bound
Lees was the first alternate coming out of a qualifier last summer at Kenwood Golf
& Country Club in Bethesda, Md., but never got the call. Hopefully, Cleary
will have a little better luck in that same position this summer.
Cleary’s teammate on a Delaware team that finished second in
the final edition of the USGA Women’s State Team Championship last fall at The
Club at Las Campanas’ Sunrise Course in Santa Fe, N.M., Archmere Academy junior
Phoebe Brinker, joined Penn State’s McLean in the group at 3-over 75.
Cleary’s Tower Hill teammate, sophomore Rylie Heflin, an
Avondale resident, carded a 76.
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