McCrery runs into a tough customer in Davis in opening-round setback in U.S. Women's Amateur at Bandon Dunes

 

   Avery McCrery has come a long way from the kid who captured the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Junior Girls’ Championship at Sandy Run Country Club in the pandemic summer of 2020.

   She played high school golf for a couple of years at the Tower Hill School in her native Wilmington, Del. and really upped the ante when she captured the title in the Girls Junior PGA Championship, one of the major national events for junior players at Congressional Country in Bethesda, Md., last summer.

   In a few weeks McCrery will join the program at Duke, the Atlantic Coast Conference power that has won seven national championships.

   McCrery gutted out a 1-over-par 73 in the second round of qualifying for match play in the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship Tuesday at the Bandon Dunes Resort’s Bandon Dunes Course on the rugged Oregon coastline.

   Hard to believe it’s been nine years since Rolling Green Golf Club in the heart of Delaware County was the stage for the U.S. Women’s Amateur. By my count, at least four winners of major professional championships have emerged from the match-play bracket at Rolling Green.

   Combined with her opening round of 2-under 70, McCrery earned a spot in the match-play bracket with a 1-under 143 total that left her in a tie for 49^th place. Nine players who finished at 1-over 145 were eliminated in a playoff Wednesday morning for the final six spots. The women’s golf scene has never been more competitive.

   McCrery’s reward for her hard work at the Dunes, where the wind has been unusually quiet, was an opening-round match with Anna Davis, the left-hander from Spring Valley, Calif. who is No. 14 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR).

   Davis quite memorably won the title in the Augusta National Women’s Amateur Championship as a bucket-hatted 16-year-old in 2022.

   Davis is a junior at Auburn and helped the Tigers reach match play in the NCAA Championship at the La Costa Spa & Resort in Carlsbad, Calif. as a freshman in the spring of 2024. She was a member of captain Meghan Stasi’s United States team that suffered a hard-fought 10.5-9.5 loss to Great Britain & Ireland in the Curtis Cup Match last summer at Sunningdale Golf Club in Berkshire, England.

   Suffice it to say, Davis has found herself in some high-leverage match-play situations.

   Davis got the jump on McCrery by winning the first two holes with birdies. Davis’ lead grew to 5-up when she won the fifth and seventh holes with pars and nine with a birdie.

   When Davis won the 13^th hole with a par she had closed out McCrery with a 6 and 5 victory. McCrery will only get better from the experience just as she has in every step of her still fledgling golf career.

   Davis will get a second-round match with Megha Ganne, the Holmdel, N.J. native and Stanford senior who is No. 11 in the Women’s WAGR. Ganne cruised to a 2 and 1 victory over Kaleiya Romero of San Jose, Calif., the older sister of Oregon standout Kiara Romero, who is very much alive at Bandon Dunes and inherited the No. 1 spot in the Women’s WAGR when Lottie Woad turned pro earlier this summer.

   Got a chance to see Ganne in action playing for the U.S. in its Curtis Cup victory over GB&I at Merion Golf Club’s iconic East Course a couple of weeks after she walked in her high school graduation in 2022.

   She helped the Cardinal capture the national championship at La Costa two springs ago and reach the Final Match this past spring before being upset by Northwestern.

   McCrery’s new teammate at Duke in a few weeks, Rianne Malixi of the Philippines and No. 8 in the Women’s WAGR, appeared to be headed for a vigorous defense of the U.S. Women’s Amateur crown she won a year ago at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Okla.

   Malixi shared medalist honors in qualifying for match play with Asterisk Talley, the 16-year-old phenom from Chowchilla, Calif. and No. 13 in the Women’s WAGR who Malixi defeated in the final of the U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship at El Caballero Country Club in Tarzana, Calif. and again in the final of the U.S. Women’s Amateur at Southern Hills a year ago.

   Malixi added a 5-under 67 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening round of 4-under 68 for a 9-under 135 total. Talley, coming off a victory in the Girls Junior PGA Championship last week at Purdue’s Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex in West Lafayette, Ind., put together a flawless 6-under 66 in Tuesday’s second round after opening with a 3-under 69 to catch her familiar rival from last summer at 9-under.

   But before you could say here we go again, Malixi and Talley were both stunned in the opening round of match play Wednesday by two of the players who survived that bulky 15-for-6 playoff just to get into the match-play bracket not long after the sun rose at the Dunes Wednesday morning.

   Malixi fell behind Arianna Lau of Hong Kong, who will join the program at reigning national champion Northwestern later this month, early in the match on her way to a 1-up loss.

   Malixi kept fighting back, tying the match for the fourth time with a win at the 17^th hole, but Lau made eagle at the Dunes’ par-5 finishing hole to take the match.

   Ella Scaysbrook, a talented Australian, jumped on Talley, another member of the U.S. Curtis Cup team at Sunningdale last summer, early and never let her off the mat in a 6 and 4 victory.

   Just shows you that anyone who survives 36 holes of stroke play and, in the case of both Lau and Scaysbrook, a playoff and gets into the match play can play. There are no easy matches on the road to a U.S. Women’s Amateur crown.

   Thailand’s Eila Galitsky, who helped South Carolina capture the Southeastern Conference title as a freshman in the spring and who is No. 6 in the Women’s WAGR, posted a sizzling 6-under 66 in the second round of qualifying for match play and finished a shot behind Malixi and Talley in third place with an 8-under 136 total.

   Galitsky advanced with a 4 and 3 decision over Madison Murr of Los Alamitos, Calif., the NCAA Division II individual champion with Cal State San Marcos in the spring.

   Canada’s Vanessa Borovilos, a sophomore at SEC power Texas A&M and No. 42 in the Women’s WAGR, broke the single-round U.S. Women’s Amateur record in qualifying when she had 10 birdies in a nine-under 63 in Tuesday’s second round that left her in a tie for fourth place with Lyla Louderbaugh a junior at Kansas from Buffalo, Mo. and Catherine Rao, a senior at Princeton from Camarillo, Calif. and No. 67 in the Women’s WAGR as they all landed on 7-under 137.

   All three of them were involved in tight battles in Tuesday’s opening round with Borovilos getting knocked out in 20 holes by former Purdue standout Ashley Kozlowski of Littleton, Colo.

   Louderbaugh, winner of the individual title in the NCAA Columbus Regional in the spring, pulled out a 1-up victory over Siuue Wu, a sophomore at Florida from Hong Kong.

   Rao, who has reached the quarterfinals of the U.S. Women’s Amateur in each of the last three summers, had to go 24 holes to pull out a victory over Allison Paik of Boston, Mass., an Ivy League rival of Rao’s at Columbia before finishing up her college career at Clemson.

   McCrery wasn’t the only past winner of the WGAP Junior Girls’ Championship in the match-play bracket at the Dunes.

   Aphrodite Deng of Short Hills, N.J. via Canada and No. 22 in the Women’s WAGR, joined McCrery in the group at 1-under 143 as she matched par in the second round of qualifying for match play with a 72 after opening with a 1-under 71.

   Deng, who captured the WGAP Junior Girls crown in 2023 at the Moorestown Field Club, was coming off a huge victory in the U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship last month at the Atlanta Athletic Club in Johns Creek, Ga.

   But Deng saw her week come to an end in the opening round of match play Wednesday as she suffered a 1-up setback at the hands of Natalie Yen of West Linn, Ore., who will join the program at Texas A&M later this month.

   It looked like Elle Lundquist, who briefly starred at Central Bucks East, was going to earn a spot in the match-play bracket at Bandon Dunes when she opened with a solid 1-under 71 in qualifying.

   But Lundquist, who will join the program at Oklahoma in the SEC later this month, carded a 4-over 76 in Tuesday’s second round for a 3-over 147 total that left her two shots out of the playoff for the final spots in the match-play bracket.

   Pretty nice effort by Rhianna Gooneratne, the 2023 PIAA Class AAA champion as a junior at Plymouth-Whitemarsh, as she added a 2-over 74 in the second round of qualifying for match play to her opening-round 75 for a 5-over 149 total.

   Strong summer for Gooneratne, who will join the program at Delaware later this month, as she teed it up in both the U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship at the Atlanta Athletic Club and in the U.S. Women’s Amateur at Bandon Dunes.

   Hannah Rabb, the 2022 PIAA Class AA champion as a junior at Warrior Run, added a 2-over 74 in the second round of qualifying for match play to her opening-round 76 for a 6-over 150 total.

   Rabb, who earned her spot in the field at Bandon Dunes with her victory in last month’s Pennsylvania Women’s Amateur Championship at Valley Brook Country Club, will join the program at Penn State later this month after a solid freshman season at James Madison.