Cauley, Hoffmann two 2009 U.S. Walker Cup teammates showing their toughness a decade later

   This September will mark 10 years since the Walker Cup Match was staged at my favorite golf course in the world, the Hugh Wilson designed East Course at Merion Golf Club, shoehorned into a neighborhood in the Ardmore section of Haverford Township that those of us who grew up in heard referred to as Merion Golf Manor.

   The United States team, captained by Merion member George “Buddy” Marucci, who grew up in that neighborhood, hard by the seventh and eighth holes, rolled to a 16.5-9.5 victory over Great Britain & Ireland.

   And if you were there, or were lucky enough to cover it, as I was in a previous life with the Delaware County Daily Times, you’ve followed the fortunes of the young guys who joyously put their talents on display. They were amateurs then, but many of them, not surprisingly in the least, have gone on to successful professional careers.

   Of course, life is rarely a straight line, hardly ever, really. So, it was interesting to scan the results of last weekend’s Farmers Insurance Open, the PGA Tour stop in San Diego won by another guy who had a pretty good day at Merion’s East Course in 2013, Justin Rose, and see a couple of alumni from that 2009 U.S. Walker Cup team who played the weekend and who stared some big-time adversity in the eye in 2018.

   Bud Cauley finished strong Sunday at Torrey Pines, firing a final-round 67 that left him the group tied for 13^th at 11-under-par 277.

   The 28-year-old Alabama product was badly injured last June when the BMW in which he was riding was involved in an accident that left Cauley with a collapsed lung, a concussion, six broken ribs and a fractured left leg. He was coming off a missed cut in The Memorial in Dublin, Ohio.

   Somehow that litany of maladies did not prevent him from making a return to the PGA Tour, but you might have had a hard time convincing him that that was possible when he was laying in a hospital bed feeling like he had broken every bone in his body with a machine helping him breath.

   He has some metal in his body, shoring up all those broken ribs, but somehow he found he was still able to swing a golf club. Among Cauley’s playing partners at home in Florida as he started to play rounds of golf again were two of his teammates at Merion in 2009, Rickie Fowler and Peter Uihlein.

   And when the wraparound 2018-’19 PGA Tour season teed off in October, four months after the accident, Cauley was ready to go. A month later, in his second start, Cauley finished in the group tied for 10^th in the Shriners Hospital for Children Open in Las Vegas.

   Not sure which course Cauley played first at Torrey Pines, but he fired a 66. A second-round 70 got him inside the cut line. He struggled a little with a third-round 74, but the final-round 67 got him in the top 15. The $121,714 and change he earned gives Cauley $342,710 for the season.

   Fowler and Uihlein were two-thirds of the Oklahoma State connection on that U.S. Walker Cup team. The third Cowboy was Morgan Hoffmann. He’s 29 and in 2016, after years of a degenerating pectoral muscle that had doctors mystified, Hoffmann was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy.

   Hoffmann played only five times on the PGA Tour in 2018, so playing four rounds at Torrey Pines had to be pretty special. He posted a pair of 70s to make the cut, struggled to a 79 in the third round and matched par in the final round with a 72 that left him in 77^th and last place among the players who made the cut. Pretty sure he had the best result of players with muscular dystrophy.

   It’s not entirely clear how long Hoffmann will still be able to compete well enough to maintain his standing on the PGA Tour, but he’s certainly not taking this muscular dystrophy thing sitting down.

   He started the Morgan Hoffmann Foundation, dedicated to finding a cure for muscular dystrophy, last year. A pro-am and auction in August at Arcola Country Club in Paramus, N.J., not far from where Hoffmann grew up in Franklin Lakes, N.J., raised $1.5 million. Many of his PGA Tour pals, in town for the first stop of the FedEx Cup Playoffs, the Northern Trust at nearby Ridgewood Country Club, were there to support him.

   Even after receiving the stunning diagnosis in late 2016, Hoffmann had a strong 2016-’17 season, making  the FedEx Cup Playoffs and earning nearly $1.3 million. It wasn’t until December of 2017 that he revealed that he had been diagnosed with muscular dystrophy. He has made nearly $5.9 million on the PGA Tour.

   A little Internet surfing reveals that she said yes when Hoffmann proposed to girlfriend Chelsea Colvard late last year. It doesn’t seem like he thinks anybody should be feeling sorry for him. And he’s in the field for this week’s Waste Management Phoenix Open. I know I’ll be rooting for him.

   Cameron Tringale, a 31-year-old Georgia Tech product and another 2009 U.S. Walker Cup alum, missed  the cut at the Farmers with rounds of 71 and 72, his 1-under 143 two shots shy of making the weekend.

   Tringale has been a solid pro, earning nearly $10 million since first playing on the PGA Tour in 2010, including a $2-million year in 2014. But he too faced a little adversity when he started missing cuts at the end of the 2017-’18 season and found himself on the outside looking in when the FedEx Cup Playoffs got started.

   That meant a trip to the Web.com Tour Playoffs in hopes of salvaging his playing privileges for the 2018-’19 campaign. A clutch third-place finish in the Web.com Tour Championship at Atlantic Beach Country Club in Atlantic Beach, Fla. got the job done.

   Fowler, who was obviously the leader of that 2009 U.S. Walker Cup team at age 20, has been the star of the group. A clutch second-round 66 enabled him to make the cut at the Farmers. A pair of weekend 74s left him in the group tied for 66^th at 1-under 287.

   Fowler, who turned 30 in December, is often criticized as all flash, but even the most cursory look at his career would blow a hole into that sort of thinking. His runnerup finish to Patrick Reed at the Masters last spring was his eighth top-five finish in a major championship. When you get that close that many times, it’s just a matter of time before he kicks the door down.

   Fowler made $4.2 million in the wraparound 2017-’18 season, good for 17^th on the money list. His career PGA Tour earnings following the Farmers stands at $34.4 million. He is No. 14 in the World Golf Ranking – one spot behind his rival on the Great Britain & Ireland team in 2009, Tommy Fleetwood -- and his value as a team member, so evident at Merion 10 years ago, has made him a welcome addition to four U.S. Ryder Cup and two U.S. Presidents Cup teams.

   I came away from that 2009 Walker Cup thinking that Fowler and Uihlein were can’t-miss future stars. Uihlein’s victory in the 2010 U.S. Amateur at Chambers Bay did nothing to discourage that kind of thinking.

   The 29-year-old Uihlein missed the cut at the Farmers with rounds of 73 and 69, his 2-under 142 total leaving him one shot out of the mix.

   Uihlein didn’t reach the PGA Tour right after his outstanding career at Oklahoma State. He spent five years honing his skills on the European Tour, winning the Madeira Islands Open on his way to Sir Henry Cotton Rookie of the Year honors in 2013. Not the normal path, but it’s been done.

   He showed up occasionally in PGA Tour events and his victory in the Web.com’s 2017 Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship at The Ohio State University’s challenging Scarlet Course was the opening he needed to finally get to show his stuff on a regular basis in the Big Show, the PGA Tour.

   And he was pretty solid in his first full year, earning just less than $1.8 million, good for 64^th on the money list and a trip to the FedEx Cup Playoffs. He made it all the way to the BMW Championship at Aronimink Golf Club and came up just short of earning a berth in the Tour Championship.

   Wouldn’t be surprised in the least to see Uihlein put it together some week in 2019 and get a bust-out first PGA Tour win.

   Another member of that 2009 U.S. Walker Cup team, left-hander Brian Harman, did not tee it up in the Farmers last weekend, but like Fowler and Uihlein, made it to the BMW Championship at Aronimink, adding a pretty successful 2017-’18 campaign on the PGA Tour to what has become a really solid professional career.

   The 32-year-old Georgia graduate – Harman turned 32 Saturday -- banged out a $2.7-million 2017-’18 campaign with a ruthlessly efficient eight top-10s and 22 cuts made in 25 starts. He is probably best remembered for his gritty tie for second in the 2017 U.S. Open at Erin Hills, but Harman has two wins and $14.5 million in earnings on the PGA Tour. He is a really good player.

   I stumbled across the name of Drew Weaver, also a member of that 2009 U.S. Walker Cup team, while posting about former Temple standout Brandon Matthews’ quest to remain eligible for the Web.com Tour in last month’s Q-School Final Stage at the Whirlwind Golf Club in Chandler, Ariz.

   I mentioned how the 31-year-old Virginia Tech grad had won The Amateur Championship at Royal Lytham & St. Annes in 2007 with the screams of horror still echoing in his ears from the deadliest school  shooting in U.S. history at the Blacksburg campus less than three months earlier.

   Weaver will be exempt for the first portion of the 2019 Web.com Tour schedule. He is still battling. Seems like there was a lot of toughness on that Walker Cup team.

   I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the mid-am on that team, Nathan Smith, the 1994 PIAA champion as a sophomore at Brookville. Smith won the Pennsylvania Golf Association’s R. Jay Sigel Match-Play Championship for the sixth year in a row last summer.

   He had a U.S. Mid-Amateur title on his resume when he arrived at Merion in 2009. He would win three more and play on two more U.S. Walker Cup teams. Smith has taken his place among the great amateur golfers produced by Pennsylvania, including his captain at Merion, Marucci, and Sigel, Marucci’s mentor and the namesake of the PAGA match-play event that Smith has dominated.

   Maybe a Walker Cup captaincy lies in Smith’s future. It says here he’s certainly deserving of consideration. Just sayin’.

   A couple of other names in the Farmers field caught my eye.

   I devoted a lot of a similar post at this time last year to Michael Kim, the California product who was the low amateur at the 2013 U.S. Open at Merion, where he finished tied for 17^th. Kim, a Torrey Pines High School product, missed the cut by two shots at the Farmers, rallying with a second-round 69 after opening with a 74.

   But the 25-year-old made the FedEx Cup Playoffs last season, a year highlighted by his first career PGA Tour victory at the John Deere Classic. He won just less than $1.4 million. I devoted a column to the college kid who was in 10^th place after three rounds at Merion in 2013. I’m not surprised to see him playing well.

   Then there is Delaware County’s adopted favorite son on the PGA Tour, Sean O’Hair. He added a second-round 69 to his opening 71 to make the cut at Torrey Pines. He struggled on the weekend and finished 76^th at 2-over 290.

   But O’Hair was coming off a tie for ninth in the Desert Classic, his 43^rd career top 10 on the PGA Tour. The 2017-’18 campaign wasn’t O’Hair’s best, but he grinded out $1.1 million in earnings and made the FedEx Cup Playoffs.

   The 36-year-old O’Hair struggled in back-to-back years earlier in his decade and twice, like Tringale did this year, battled his way through the Web.com Tour Playoffs to retain his playing privileges on the PGA Tour. And he’s still out there battling.

   Did somebody say Walker Cup? A couple of members of the 2017 U.S. team that rolled to a 19-7 victory over Great Britain & Ireland up the coast from Torrey Pines at Los Angeles Country Club played the weekend at the Farmers.

   Doug Ghim, the former University of Texas standout who was the low amateur at last spring’s Masters, fell back in the final round to finish tied for 20^th at 10-under 278.

   Ghim had himself a couple of pretty good weeks in the California sun two summers ago, finishing as the runnerup to Doc Redman in a really good final in the U.S. Amateur at Riviera Country Club and then going 4-0 in the Walker Cup Match.

   Braden Thornberry, the 2017 NCAA individual champion at Rich Harvest Farms as a sophomore at Mississippi, finished among the group tied for 52^nd at 4-under 284 in the Farmers.

   Ghim will be playing on the Web.com Tour in 2019 while Thornberry struggled at the Q-School Final Stage and will have to rely on sponsor’s exemptions to get starts on the PGA Tour and the Web.com Tour. But the kind of showings they had last weekend would seem to indicate that they’ll find a way to get to the Big Show on a regular basis before long.

   Of course, an alum of that spectacularly talented 2017 U.S. Walker Cup team already owns a PGA Tour victory. Former Texas A&M standout Cameron Champ won the Sanderson Farms Championship last fall which means he’s exempt on the PGA Tour for this season and all of next.

   Champ missed the cut at the Farmers with rounds of 75 and 71, but the bomber has already flashed his considerable ability in taking the Sanderson Farms at the Country Club of Jackson in Jackson, Miss.

Pano snags a second Orange Blossom Tour win by taking the Jones/Doherty Championship

   You know it’s getting kind of scary when Alexa Pano, the 14-year-old phenom from Lake Worth, Fla., is talking about how she didn’t quite have her best stuff moments after finishing off a hard-fought 1-up victory over Clemson product and aspiring professional Marisa Messana of Plantation, Fla. in Friday’s final of the Ione D. Jones/Doherty Women’s Amateur Championship at Coral Ridge Country Club in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

   It was the second Jones/Doherty title in three years for Pano, who captured the prestigious event on the annual Orange Blossom Tour of women’s amateur events each winter in South Florida for the first time in 2016 as a 12-year-old. She lost in the final a year ago to Meghan Stasi, the four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion from Oakland Park, Fla.

   It was the 87^th playing of the Doherty and the 34^th edition of the Ione D. Jones for senior players, but the event is commonly referred to as the Jones/Doherty.

   The win caps off a spectacular five weeks of golf in South Florida for a favorite daughter of the region. The week before Christmas, Pano captured the first stop on the Orange Blossom Tour, the Women’s Dixie Amateur at Woodlands Country Club in Tamarac, Fla., beating a field that included some top-notch college players.

   After winning the 16-to-18 division in the Junior Honda Classic at PGA National Resort & Spa’s Champion Course in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., Pano was the runnerup to Florida State junior Amanda Doherty in the South Atlantic Women’s Amateur Championship, better known as The Sally, at Oceanside Country Club in Ormond Beach, Fla., another stop on the Orange Blossom Tour.

   She was right back at it this week in reclaiming the Jones/Doherty title she won two years ago. Pano was the qualifying medalist Monday with a 1-over-par 73 at Coral Ridge, a Robert Trent Jones design.    

   Maybe she was running out of gas – but considering Pano beat fellow teen phenom Lucy Li on the 18^th hole of a semifinal match and lost to Yealimi Noh on the 33^rd hole of a scheduled 36-hole final on the same day in last summer’s U.S. Girls’ Junior Amateur Championship at Poppy Hills Golf Course on northern California’s Monterey Peninsula, that doesn’t seem likely – still, she got the job done in Friday’s final against Massana.

   “It was a pretty tough day,” Pano told the Coral Ridge website. “I haven’t really played well this whole week, especially (Friday). It was just not my best. There were a couple of things that I did that just kind of held it together and helped me finish it off.”

   When Massana, a fixture in the Clemson starting lineup for four years, parred the seventh hole, she had a 2-up lead on Pano. But then Pano ripped off wins at nine, 10 and 11 to take a 1-up advantage.

Massana evened the match when she won the 12^th hole with a par. But Pano restored her 1-up advantage when she won the 13^th hole with a bogey and increased her lead to 2-up with four holes to play when she rolled in a 20-foot birdie putt at the 14^th.

   Massana kept battling and sent the match to the 18^th hole when she birdied the 17^th hole to cut Pano’s lead to 1-up.

   Massana then drilled a hybrid out of a bunker onto the green at the finishing hole, but her 30-foot birdie try came up just short. Pano left her approach short of the 18^th green, but she calmly got it up and down for a clinching par.

   Pano had a bye into Wednesday’s quarterfinals and she battled some windy conditions – she said she’s learned to enjoy the challenges of playing in the wind, hoo boy, even scarier still – to defeat Jamie Freedman of Miami Beach, who is coming off a solid college career at Nova Southeastern, 5 and 4.

   Pano then cruised to a 5 and 4 decision over Marie Arnoux of Miami in the semifinals.

   Massana had a tougher road, starting with a 3 and 2 victory over Dana Williams, another standout South Florida teen from Boca Raton who has qualified for the U.S. Women’s Open each of the last two summers and will start her college career at Auburn at the end of the summer.

   Massana then had to knock off the defending champion, Stasi, the 40-year-old South Jersey native who remains one of top mid-ams in the country. Stasi was exempt from qualifying as the defending champion and got a bye into the quarterfinals, but she spent her two days off trying to shake off the flu, which she couldn’t quite do.

   Despite not feeling her best, Stasi, who won the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Match-Play Championship seven straight times when she was known as Meghan Bolger, still proved to be a tough customer, taking Massana to the final hole before falling, 2-up.

   Stasi won the last of her four U.S. Women’s Mid-Am titles in 2012, but she reached the quarterfinals in last summer’s edition at Norwood Hills Country Club in St. Louis.

   The win over Stasi earned Massana a semifinal showdown with another standout mid-am, Courtney McKim of Raleigh, N.C., a member of Alabama’s 2012 NCAA championship team. McKim lost in the round of 16 in last summer’s U.S. Women’s Mid-Am at Norwood Hills.

   Massana got past McKim, 3 and 2, to earn her shot for the championship against Pano.

   Not sure what is on the upcoming calendar for Pano, but she has accepted an invitation to play in the inaugural Augusta National Women’s Amateur April 3 to 6. It will be an elite international field of women’s amateur golfers and Pano will likely be the youngest player in the field, certainly one of the youngest.

   The first two rounds of the 54-hole event will be played at the Champions Resort Golf Club in Augusta, Ga. with the top 30 and ties getting to tee it up in the final round on the big stage, Augusta National Golf Club, which will be in full Masters mode with the prestigious event coming up the following week.

   Making the top 30 would be a very attainable goal for Pano, who would make a triumphant return to Augusta National, where she has been a three-time Drive, Chip and Putt National Finals qualifier, winning the 10-11 division in 2016 and the 12-13 division in 2017.

   For the third year in a row Friday, the Senior Championship Flight – the 34^th Ione D. Jones Women’s Senior Amateur Championship – came down to a match between Lisa Schlesinger of Fort Myers, Fla. and Canadian Terrill Samuel and for third year in a row, Schlesinger captured the title with a 5 and 3 victory.

   Schlesinger, who turned 61 this week, has been a force at the U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur, earning medalist honors in qualifying in back-to-back years in 2011 and 2012.

   Samuel lost in the semifinals of last fall’s U.S. Senior Women’s Am at the Orchid Island Golf & Beach Club in Vero Beach, Fla. a year after falling to fellow Canadian – and Toronto area golfing buddy -- Judith Kyrinis in the final of the U.S. Senior Women’s Am at Waverly Country Club in Portland, Ore.

   The Senior First Flight title went to Mary Jane Hiestand of Naples, Fla., who claimed a 2 and 1 victory over Andreas Kraus of Baltimore in the final.

   Hiestand, at age 58, made an epic run to the final of the 2017 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur – not the U.S. Women’s Senior Amateur, the Mid-Am – at Champions Golf Club’s Cypress Creek Course in Houston before falling to Kelsey Chugg. One of her victims along the was Jones/Doherty semifinalist McKim, whom she edged in 19 holes in the quarterfinals at Champions.

   In the Senior Second Flight final, Sylvie Van Molle of France rolled to a 6 and 5 decision over Maggie Brady of Washington, D.C.

   The title in the Senior Third Flight, a 36-hole stroke-play event, went to Katherine Moore-Lilly of Longboat Key, Fla. with a 180 total. Kay Tyler of Springfield, Va. was four shots behind Moore-Lilly in second at 184.

Florida State's Doherty fires final-round 69 for a three-shot victory in The Sally

   Amanda Doherty was the rising star on the Florida State women’s golf team the last two years.

   Suddenly last fall, the junior from Atlanta found herself as the veteran on a team filled with talented freshmen, including Sweden’s Frida Kinhult, the No. 6 player in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking.

   Well, Doherty will have a little hardware to show off to her young teammates when she gets back to Tallahassee after she fired a 3-under-par 69 at Oceanside Country Club in Ormond Beach, Fla. Saturday to capture the title in the Women’s South Atlantic Amateur Championship, The Sally for short.

   The Sally is one of the events on the Orange Blossom Tour of amateur events that draws many of the collegiate players looking to keep their games sharp during the two-month break in their season and some of the many rising junior stars. The Sally has some history. It goes back to 1926 and Doherty added her name to the trophy with a brilliant final round.

   Doherty had grabbed the lead with an even-par 72 in chilly conditions in Wednesday’s opening round at Oceanside. She fell back a little with a 4-over 76 Thursday and surged back into contention with a 1-under 71 in Friday’s third round before matching the low round of the tournament with her final-round 69. It gave her an even-par 288 total and a three-shot victory over Alexa Pano, the 14-year-old from Lake Worth, Fla. who isn’t your average 14-year-old, particularly when it comes Orange Blossom Tour time.

   Pano, who captured the title in the Women’s Dixie Amateur in Tamarac, Fla. last month, had taken a one-shot lead over Doherty into the final round, finished up with a solid 1-over 73, but couldn’t keep up with the birdie barrage put on by Doherty. Pano was the runnerup with a 3-over 291 total.

   Doherty carded birdies at the second, fourth and sixth holes to make the turn at 3-under for the round. She then ripped off three straight birdies at 11, 12 and 13 to get to 6-under for the day. The blazing start gave Doherty more than enough cushion to enable her to withstand bogeys at 15, 17 and 18 on her way to the clubhouse.

   Pano might be 14, but last summer she had some outstanding performances on some big stages. She hadn’t even turned 14 when she had her longest day on the golf course, defeating fellow phenom Lucy Li, the Redwood Shores, Calif. teen who played on the U.S. Curtis Cup team last summer, 1-up, in the semifinals of the U.S. Girls’ Junior Amateur at Poppy Hills Golf Course on northern California’s Monterey Peninsula before falling, 4 and 3, to another California teen standout, Yealimi Noh, in the scheduled 36-hole final.

   Yes, 51 holes all in one day. Long story, but you can check out the post I did wrapping up the U.S. Girls’ Junior and the U.S. Junior Amateur last summer if you want more on that crazy day of golf.

   A couple of weeks later, Pano blitzed The Golf Club of Tennessee with a brilliant 5-under 66 in the opening round of qualifying for match play in the U.S. Women’s Amateur. She finished tied for fourth in qualifying before falling in the opening round of match play to Isabella Fierro, the Mexican phenom whom Pano had knocked off in the second round on her way to the final at Poppy Hills.

   Pano had opened with a pair of 73s in The Sally that gave her a share of the lead at the halfway point of the 72-hole tournament and added an adventurous even-par 72 in Friday’s third round to take a one-shot advantage over Doherty into the final round at 2-over 218.

   Pano’s front nine in Friday’s third round included five bogeys, two birdies and an eagle. Her back nine was comparatively uneventful as she notched a single birdie to end up at even for the day.

   Not certain if Pano will tee it up in the Ione D. Jones/Doherty Women’s Amateur Championship, which gets under way Monday at Coral Ridge Country Club in Fort Lauderdale. But she did make the final of the match-play event a year ago before falling to four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion Meghan Stasi, Pano’s teammate on the Florida team that finished third in the 2017 – and last – USGA Women’s Amateur Team Championship at The Club at Las Campanas’ Sunrise Course in Santa Fe, N.M. Oh yeah, Pano won the Jones/Doherty as a 12-year-old two years ago.

   It was six shots behind Pano to third place in The Sally as Maryland’s Laura Van Respaille, a sophomore from France, ended up at 9-over 297 after carding a final-round 75.

   Mackenzie Moore -- looks like she’s a Texas teen who plays out of the Trophy Club -- finished alone in fourth, a shot behind Van Respaille at 298 after a final-round 74.

   Texas’ Maddie Luitwieler, a senior from Katy, Texas, shared fifth place with Paige Hilinski -- looks like she’s another junior standout -- at 300, two shots behind Moore.

   Luitwieler has to be at her best just to make the lineup for the loaded Longhorns. She shared the halfway lead with Pano at 2-over 146 after matching par in the second round with a 72 before falling back with rounds of 79 and 75. Hilinski got her piece of fifth with a strong 2-under 70 in the final round.

   Bethune-Cookman’s Yudika Ann Rodriguez, a senior from Puerto Rico, was another two shots behind Luitwieler and Hilinski in seventh at 302 after a final-round 76. Chloe Kovelesky -- looks like another South Florida junior standout from Boca Raton -- was a shot behind Rodriguez in eighth at 303. Kovelesky tacked on a final-round 78 after posting three straight 75s.

   Heading a group of five players tied for ninth at 304 was North Carolina State’s India Clyburn, a senior from England and a member of the Great Britain & Ireland Curtis Cup team that fell to a powerful U.S. team last summer at Quaker Ridge Golf Club in Scarsdale, N.Y. Clyburn struggled to a final-round 79.

   Somebody in that fivesome at 304 who did not struggle in Saturday’s final round was Lauren Clark -- looks like yet another talented South Florida teen from Orlando. Clark matched Doherty for the low round of the tournament, a 3-under 69, to surge to a top-10 finish.

   Three other collegians rounded out the group at 304, including UCF’s Ana Laura Collado Diaz, a sophomore from Mexico, Nevada’s Victoria Gailey, a freshman from Tigard, Ore., and Van Respaille’s  fellow Terp, Ludovica Scandroglio, a senior from Italy.

   Diaz finished up with an 80 while Gailey and Scandroglio posted matching 3-over 75s in the final round.