Mariel Galdiano had yet to strike a shot in a college match
when I watched her fire a brilliant 6-under-par 65 to capture medalist honors
in qualifying for match play at the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur at Rolling Green
Golf Club in the heart of Delco in Springfield.
But the native of Pearl City, Hawaii had already built up
some scar tissue on an international stage earlier that year when she
represented the United States in the Curtis Cup Match against Great Britain
& Ireland in front of a raucous bunch of Irish golf fans at Dun Laoghaire
Golf Club in suburban Dublin.
You got the impression that going low in the second round of
qualifying for the U.S. Women’s Amateur was nothing compared to having the
golf-mad Republic of Irish rooting against you in a Curtis Cup Match.
“When you’re in that situation with cameras on you and a big
crowd cheering for GB&I, I had to learn to focus on myself,” Galdiano told
me that day, the memory of an 11.5-8.5 loss for the U.S. to a very talented
GB&I team still clearly fresh in her memory.
It was a really strong GB&I team that included Bronte
Law of England, an Annika Award winner at UCLA, as well as Leona Maguire, one
of the best woman golfers every produced by the Emerald Isle who put together
one of the finest careers in the history of women’s college golf at Duke,
collecting a couple of Annika Awards herself.
Galdiano, No. 34 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking
(WAGR), is 21 now and in her senior season at UCLA. She got a little Curtis Cup
revenge in 2018 when she was again chosen for the U.S. team, this time on home
soil at Quaker Ridge Golf Club, an A.W. Tillinghast classic in Scarsdale, N.Y.,
and an exceedingly talented bunch of Americans trounced GB&I, 17-3.
But apparently Galdiano wants more, she wants to get another
shot at GB&I on its home turf. Galdiano was one of 12 amateur standouts who
was invited to participate in a Curtis Cup practice session Dec. 15 to 17 at
Loblolly in Hobe Sound, Fla.
U.S. Curtis Cup captain Sarah Ingram, a former Duke standout
and a three-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion, will get a chance to bond
with some potential members of the eight-woman team she’ll take into battle
June 12 to 14 at Conwy Golf Club in Caernarvonshire, Wales. GB&I has won
the Curtis Cup the last two times it has been contested on its side of the
Atlantic Ocean.
It is quite a commitment for a college senior like Galdiano
to make. She will have to put any professional aspirations on hold through the
first half of 2020.
Galdiano’s Pac-12 rival at Stanford, Andrea Lee, was the
only other U.S. player besides Galidano who teed it up at Dun Laoghhaire and
returned in 2018 at Quaker Ridge.
Lee would be automatically eligible for the 2020 U.S. team
as the winner of the McCormack Medal, but declined the invitation because she’s
turning pro. Lee earned her LPGA Tour card by finishing in a tie for 30th
place in the LPGA Q-Series, an eight-round marathon held at two different
Pinehurst courses earlier this fall. Lee announced last week that will forgo
the rest of her senior season at Stanford and join the LPGA Tour in January.
Pretty sure that will leave Galdiano as the only player on
the U.S. side from the 2018 Curtis Cup Match who has not turned professional.
Only three other college seniors are among the dozen invited
to next month’s practice session at Loblolly, Galdiano’s Pac-12 rival at
Southern California, Allisen Corpuz of Honolulu, Hawaii and No. 27 in the Women’s
WAGR, Louisville’s Lauren Hartlage of Elizabethtown, Ky. and No. 50 in the
Women’s WAGR, and Furman’s Natalie Srinivasen of Spartanburg, S.C. and No. 38
in the Women’s WAGR.
Corpuz has helped the Trojans qualify for match play in the
NCAA Championship in each of the last two seasons at Southern Cal.
The highest-ranked player invited to Loblolly, Wake Forest
junior Emilia Migliaccio of Cary, N.C. and No. 11 in the Women’s WAGR,
represented the United States in the Pan-American Games in Lima, Peru last
summer. Migliaccio struck gold twice in the Pan-Am Games, winning the
individual women’s competition and as part of Team USA’s mixed team.
Texas junior Katlyn Papp of Austin, Texas is No. 13 in the
Women’s WAGR. Papp and the Longhorns are No. 1 in the Golfstat rankings
as Division I women’s golf takes its midseason break. Papp joined forces with
her current Texas teammate Hailee Cooper to win the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball
Championship at the Streamsong Resort’s Blue Course in central Florida.
A couple of Kims, Duke sophomore Gina Kim of Chapel Hill,
N.C. and No. 26 in the Women’s WAGR and Vanderbilt sophomore Auston Kim of St.
Augustine, Fla. and No. 46 in the Women’s WAGR, will also join the practice
session at Loblolly.
Gina Kim opened the U.S. Women’s Open at the Country Club of
Charleston last spring with a 5-under-par 66 and remained on the leaderboard
for a long time before finishing in a tie for 12th place and earning
low-amateur honors.
That was less than two weeks after Kim helped the Blue Devils claim
an NCAA title at The Blessings Golf Club in Fayetteville, Ark., contributing a
couple of huge match wins in the quarterfinals against Stanford and in the
semifinals against Arizona.
Auston Kim captured the individual title and led the
Commodores to the team crown in the NCAA Auburn Regional last spring.
Another of the 2018-’19 college season’s breakout freshmen stars
was Ohio State’s Anneka Seumanutafa of Emmitsburg, Md. and No. 45 in the
Women’s WAGR. Seumanutafa helped the Buckeyes capture the Big Ten title last
spring.
A couple of kids have also been invited to the practice
session at Loblolly, 16-year-old Rose Zhang of Irvine, Calif. and No. 23 in the
Women’s WAGR and 15-year-old Alexa Pano of Lake Worth, Fla. and No. 31 in the
Women’s WAGR.
Don’t be fooled by their ages, though, Zhang and Pano are
tremendously talented and experienced youngsters.
Zhang, who will join the powerhouse Stanford program in the
summer of 2021, was part of the U.S. golf contingent along with Miglicaccio for
the Pan-Am Games and came home with a gold medal in the mixed team competition.
I’ve been a fan of Pano’s ever since she earned her first
American Junior Golf Association (AJGA) victory in the PDQ / Philadelphia
Runner Junior at Saucon Valley Country Club’s Weyhill Course in 2016 at age 12.
Less than a month earlier, Pano, still 11 at the time, teed it up in the U.S.
Women’s Amateur at Rolling Green. She failed to make match play, but Pano’s
made the match-play bracket in the U.S. Women’s Amateur in each of the ensuing
three years, finishing in a tie for fourth in qualifying in 2018 at the Golf
Club of Tennesssee after taking the lead after the opening round a few weeks
before she turned 14.
The USGA International Team Selection Committee extended one
last invitation to the practice session at Loblolly to one of the top mid-ams,
29-year-old Lauren Greenlief of Ashburn, Va.
Greenlief is the only other USGA champion besides Papp among
the Loblolly dozen, having won the 2015 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur. She reached
the semifinals of last summer’s U.S. Women’s Mid-Am at Forest Highlands Golf
Club’s Meadows Course in Flagstaff, Ariz. Greenlief, who starred collegiately
at Virginia, reached the quarterfinals of the 2018 U.S. Women’s Amateur at the
Golf Club of Tennessee, proving she can keep up with the young kids.
The Curtis Cup is a tough commitment for a mid-am, many of
whom have jobs, among other responsibilities. The other 11 women invited to
Loblolly are all among the top 50 in the Women’s WAGR, but Greenlief has
managed to find the time to get there and a veteran player is certainly worth a
look for what figures to be a young U.S. team.
The top three Americans in the Women’s WAGR on April 8 of
next year will be automatic picks for the U.S. Curtis Cup. The USGA will
announce the rest of the team the following week.
No comments:
Post a Comment