Walker opens play in qualifying for match play in U.S. Women's Amateur with 76 at Woodmont

   When the coronavirus pandemic forced the sudden end to the 2019-2020 college golf season, the decision seemed simple for Brynn Walker, the North Carolina senior who won back-to-back PIAA Class AAA championships in 2014 and 2015 at Radnor High.

   Walker had earned some status on the Symetra Tour for 2020 during the LPGA Q-School last summer. Her college career seemingly over, Walker, who plays out of St. Davids Golf Club, would turn pro, play in whatever Symetra Tour events she could and see how far she could get in the LPGA Q-School.

   But then the NCAA said it would offer an extra year of eligibility for those affected by the pandemic. And then the LPGA said there would be no Q-School in 2020, the players who had earned their way to the tour at the 2019 LPGA Q-Series would retain that eligibility in 2021. And then the United States Golf Association announced it would exempt players who reached the second round of match play in last summer’s U.S. Women’s Amateur at Old Waverly Golf Club in West Point, Miss. into the field for this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur, which teed off Monday at Woodmont Country Club in Rockville, Md.

   It all added up to Walker deciding to remain an amateur, return to North Carolina for some post-graduate work and a fifth year with the Tar Heels and take the spot in this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur, her fourth straight trip to the top amateur event in the world for women and her fifth overall, but the first she didn’t have to grind through a qualifier to get to.

   Walker explained all of this to The Inquirer’s Joe Juliano in a story that appeared in The Inky’s July 23 print edition.

   “At first, it was definitely very disappointing for me,” the 22-year-old Walker told Juliano. “It was like, wow, everything that I had been planning for at the end of this year, everything I had dreamed, is not going to be happening.

   “But at the same time, it’s been a pretty good time. I’ve been working on my swing and my game. There’s nothing I can do to change the circumstances, so I might as just adapt and make the most of it.”

  Yeah, in the year of the coronavirus, it’s good to have a Plan B … and C and D and maybe E and F.

   The 120^th U.S. Women’s Amateur is one of just four surviving USGA championships for 2020 and the first to tee off.

   Of course, it wouldn’t be 2020 if Mother Nature didn’t throw a little hurricane at the USGA when it finally gets its championship season off the ground. But the officials of golf’s ruling body in this country have faced so much adversity in 2020, I suspect the prospect of losing a day of play to rain was greeted with a collective shrug.

   Walker did get her round in before the outer reaches of Isaias started to affect Woodmont. She had an up-and-down round of 4-over-par 76.

   Play was suspended a little before 4:30 p.m. and resumed a couple of hours later. Walker stood in a tie for 73^rd place – it looks like almost all the field completed play and Walker actually moved up 10 spots since I started writing this post -- and will have another round to try to move into the top 64 that qualify for match play.

   Walker had birdies at the fourth, 11^th and 14^th holes to offset seven bogeys, two of which came late at 16 and 18. At a glance, Woodmont’s closing stretch was playing fairly gnarly.

   In her fourth try a year ago, Walker finally earned a match-play berth. She was 1-down to two-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion Julia Potter-Bobb with two holes to play at Old Waverly and won the last two holes to pull out a 1-up victory. Walker didn’t know it at the time, but it was a win that would earn her a trip to this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur.

   With the opening round basically complete, a couple of Atlantic Coast Conference standouts, Wake Forest sophomore Rachel Kuehn, coming off an impressive victory in last month’s North & South Women’s Amateur Championship at the Pinehurst Resort in North Carolina, and Virginia junior Riley Smyth each completed a 4-under 68 and were tied atop the leaderboard.

   Both are North Carolina natives, Kuehn hailing from Asheville and Smith coming out of Cary, which, it seems to this blogger, is a bit of a golf hotbed.

   Kuehn had six birdies against two bogeys while Smyth made five birdies to offset a lone bogey.

   Rachel Heck, who is coming to the end of an outstanding junior career and is headed for Stanford, and Auburn sophomore Megan Schofill got back out on the course and each completed a 3-under 69 that left them in a trio tied for third place.

   Heck of Memphis, Tenn. and Schofill of Monticello, Fla. and No. 27 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR) both reached the quarterfinals in the North & South at Pinehurst.

   Also in the house with a 69 was Maria Fernanda Escauriza of Paraguay, who had her senior season at San Diego State cut short by the pandemic, but, like Walker, is still an amateur. Escauriza had three birdies and nary a bogey on her scorecard.

   Alone in sixth place at 2-under 70 was Phoebe Brinker, who lost her senior season at Archmere Academy to the pandemic this spring. Brinker, a Wilmington, Del. native who has had an outstanding junior career and is headed for Duke, had it to 3-under with birdies at the fifth, eighth and 12^th holes before making her lone bogey of the day at the 15^th.

   Brinker’s round was interrupted after she had completed nine holes, so she had to get back out there and play the back nine in what, I’m fairly certain, was some fading daylight.

   Heading the group tied for eighth place at 1-under 71 was Wake Forest senior Emilia Migliaccio, another Cary, N.C. product who is No. 4 in the Women’s WAGR. Migliaccio, who helped the Demon Deacons reach the final of the 2019 NCAA Championship at The Blessings Golf Club in Fayetteville, Ark., also reached the quarterfinals in the North & South at Pinehurst.

   Also in with a 71 was Megha Ganne, the Holmdel, N.J. teen who stormed into the semifinals a year ago at Old Waverly before falling to eventual runnerup Albane Valenzuela of Switzerland.

   Another Jersey girl, Yale junior Ami Gianchandani, a product of The Pingry School, carded a 3-over 75 and is in the group tied for 55^th place.

   Jackie Rogowicz, who starred scholastically at Pennsbury and collegiately at Penn State, was in the group tied for 105^th place with a 6-over 78.

   Rogowicz won the Pennsylvania Women’s Amateur Championship a year ago, but that tournament also started Monday, so she was unable to defend. Rogowicz was 1-over through 13 holes, but stumbled a little down Woodmont’s tough closing stretch.

   South Jersey native Meghan Stasi, a four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion and owner of eight Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Match Play Championship wins, carded an 81 and was in the group tied for 125^th place. Stasi, who was known as Meghan Bolger when she won her first seven Philadelphia Women’s Amateur crowns – all in a row – lives in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. these days.