Stasi teams with Kim to capture International Four-Ball at Wanderers

   It’s a good time to play a little catch-up on the final event in the Orange Blossom Tour, the 72^nd International Four-Ball Championship, which had a Valentine’s Day finish last month at its usual home, The Wanderers Club in Wellington, Fla.

   I’ve gotten in the habit of reporting on the early events in the Orange Blossom Tour, the unofficial series of women’s amateur events in South Florida, because there isn’t a whole lot of golf going on from Christmas to Valentine’s Day. The Women’s Dixie Amateur, the Harder Hall Invitational, The Sally, and the Jones/Doherty Championship often draw some top college players trying to sharpen their games during the midseason break in their season.

   By the time the International Four-Ball is contested, the spring portion of the college season is under way. What it draws are some of the top women’s mid-am and senior amateur players in the country.

   For the fifth time in her glittering amateur career, Meghan Stasi, the South Jersey native who resides in Oakland Park, Fla., put her name on the International Four-Ball trophy, although she did so with a first-time partner in Ina Kim, the former junior and collegiate standout who has returned to amateur golf with a vengeance.

   Stasi and Kim teamed up with a pair of 3-under-par 69s over the 5,910-yard, par-72 Wanderers layout to finish two shots clear of a leaderboard littered with USGA champions, past, present and, I’m guessing, future, with a 6-under 138 total.

   The 40-year-old Stasi, an eight-time winner of the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Match-Play Championship, has won the U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur four times and remains one of the top women’s mid-am players in the country.

   Kim, a Los Angeles native, was the runnerup in the 2000 U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship and played college golf at Northwestern. But she wanted to conquer the world of high finance, not professional golf. After a decade of working in boardrooms all over the world, she picked up the sticks again a couple of years ago and is quickly becoming one of the top mid-ams in the country. Stasi defeated Kim in the 2017 Florida State Golf Association Women’s Mid-Am final.

   Stasi and Kim shared the opening-round lead with the duos of Katie Miller, the two-time Pennsylvania Women’s Amateur champion from Jeannette, and Lauren Greenlief, the 2015 U.S. Women’s Mid-Am champion from Ashburn, Va., and reigning U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion Shannon Johnson of Newton, Mass and Megan Buck, one of Johnson’s regular partners in Massachusetts four-ball events.

   Miller and Greenlief, who crashed the college party and carried the mid-am banner into last summer’s U.S. Women’s Amateur quarterfinals at The Golf Club of Tennessee, were the two-time defending champions.

   When Stasi and Kim made bogeys at the eighth and ninth holes, the same three teams headed for the back nine tied. Stasi enabled her team to put a nose in front when she made birdie at the 10^th. Kim did the rest, ripping off five birdies in the next seven holes. Neither Stasi nor Kim could do better than bogey at the last, but they had built enough of a cushion to withstand that misstep and held on for a two-shot victory.

   Miller and Greenlief carded a 1-under 71 to claim runnerup honors at 4-under 140. Johnson and Buck, who caddied for Johnson in the 2016 and 2017 U.S. Women’s Mid-Ams, fell back with a 1-over 73, but finished third at 143.

   A couple of New Jersey ladies, Alicia Kapheim of Pennington and Jersey City’s Tara Fleming, a former LPGA Tour player who reached the semifinals of the 2017 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championship at Waverly Country Club in Portland, Ore., added an even-par 72 to their opening round of 1-under 71 to finish third at 1-under 143.

   Ellen Port of St. Louis has a USGA trophy for every day of the week as a three-time U.S. Senior Women’s and four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Am winner. Port teamed with Lara Tennant, who captured the 2018 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur last fall at the Orchard Island Golf & Beach Club in Vero Beach, Fla., to finish fifth at even-par 144. They opened with a 1-under 71 before adding a 1-over 73.

   Tennant lives in Portland and made her U.S. Senior Women’s Am debut on her home course at Waverly in 2017.

   Stasi’s last International Four-Ball title came when she teamed with Tara Joy-Connelly of North Palm Beach, Fla. in 2014. Joy-Connelly’s partner at Wanderers was another of Stasi’s four-ball pals, Dawn Woodard, with whom Stasi has teamed in each of the first four editions of the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship.

   Joy-Connelly and Woodard shared sixth place with Mary Jane Hiestand, the Naples, Fla. resident who, at age 58, made a remarkable run to the final of the 2017 U.S. Women’s Mid-Am at the Champions Golf Club in Houston, and Canadian Judith Kyrinis, who won the 2017 Senior Women’s Amateur at Waverly, at 1-over 145.

   Both teams matched par in the second round with 72s after each duo opened with a 1-over 73.

Stasi and Woodard of Greenville, S.C. will once again team up for this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball, which tees off April 26 at Timuquana Country Club in Jacksonville, Fla. Pretty sure they have made match play each year in the short history of the event.

   Miller and Greenlief will also partner for the second year in a row in the U.S. Women’s Four-Ball. They failed to make match play last spring at El Cabellero Country Club in Tarazana, Calif. and are planning to make amends for that performance.

   Christine Martin and Patricia Handley joined forces to capture the Middle Division of the International Four-Ball with a 153 total after adding 75 to their opening-round 78.

   Jennifer Fox and Patti Petersen claimed top honors in the Middle First Division with a 165 total after adding an 85 to their opening-round 78.