Koivun, Ortengren widen their leads after two rounds of Rolex Tournament of Champions

    Downingtown West sophomore Nick Gross, crowned the PIAA Class AAA champion last month, fell back a little in Tuesday’s second round, but remained in the top 10 in the premier event on the American Junior Golf Association (AJGA) circuit, the Rolex Tournament of Champions at the PGA National Resort & Spa in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.

   Gross had opened with a 3-under-par 69 at PGA National’s Fazio Course, but struggled a little over the 7,122-yard, par-71 Champions Course in Tuesday’s second round, carding a 3-over 74 that left him among the group tied for 10^th place with an even-par 143 total.

   Jackson Koivun of San Jose, Calif. had grabbed a one-shot lead with an opening round of 5-under 67 on the Fazio Course. Koivun, who will join the Auburn program next summer, widened his lead to four shots as his 3-under 68 was again the best round of the day and left him with an 8-under 135 total.

   Couldn’t locate the second-round starting times, so I’m not certain whether Gross started off the first or the 10^th tee. Gross was up and down on the outgoing nine at the Champions Course. He birdied the first hole, made bogey at two, birdie at four, bogey at six, birdie at seven and bogey at nine.

   Gross was a little steadier on the back nine with seven pars, but he made a double bogey at the 12^th hole and a bogey at 14.

   Gross is still playing some solid golf against one of the best junior fields assembled each year, filled mostly with high school juniors and seniors. The AJGA dubs its Thanksgiving week event The Greatest Week in Junior Golf.

   After winning the Ches-Mont League’s individual crown for the second year in a row, Gross lost in a playoff at Turtle Creek Golf Course in defense of the District One Class AAA crown he won as a freshman. But he bounced back at the Heritage Hills Golf Resort in York County by claiming the big prize, the state championship, in a playoff with North Pocono’s Billy Pabst.

   Koivun was really solid in Tuesday’s second round. Pretty sure he started off the 10^th tee and offset bogeys at the 12^th and 18^th holes with birdies at 14 and 17 on the Champions Course’s incoming nine. He followed up a birdie on the second hole with an eagle at the par-5 third hole to get it to 3-under for the day.

   A trio of future Atlantic Coast Conference rivals, Michael La Sasso, a North Carolina State recruit from Raleigh, N.C., Boyd Owens, a Wake Forest recruit from Baton Rouge, La., and Ben James a Virginia recruit from Milford, Conn., landed in a tie for second place, four shots behind Koivun at 4-under 139.

   La Sasso matched par with a 71 at the Champions Course after opening with a 4-under 68 at the Fazio Course. Owens registered a solid 2-under 69 after opening with a 2-under 70. James, who owns wins in three AJGA invitationals in 2021, carded a 1-under 70 at the Champions Course Tuesday after opening with a 3-under 69.

   Caleb Surratt of Indian Trail, N.C., an impressive winner of last summer’s Boys Junior PGA Championship at the Kearney Hills Golf Links in Lexington, Ky., headed a group of four players tied for fifth place at 3-under 140.

   Surratt, who will join the program at Tennessee next summer, matched par at the Champions Course with a 71 after opening with a 3-under 69.

   Joining Surratt at 3-under were Eric Lee of Fullerton, Calif., Jean-Philippe Parr of Canada and William Love of Atlanta.

   Lee, who will join the program at California in the summer of 2023, and Love, who is headed for Duke next summer, matched Surratt’s splits, each signing for an even-par 71 at the Champions Course after opening with a 69 at the Fazio Course. Parr registered a 1-over 72 in Tuesday’s second round after opening with a 68 at the Fazio Course.

   Much like Koivun on the boys side, Meja Ortengren of Sweden widened her lead to four shots in the Girls division, adding a 2-under 70 at the Fazio Course to the opening round of 4-under 68 she posted at the Champions Course, which plays to a par of 72 for the girls. That left Ortengren with a 6-under 138 total.

   Ortengren’s closest pursuer was Kaitlyn Schroeder of Jacksonville, Fla. as she added a 1-under 71 at the Fazio Course, which measured 6,165 yards and played to a par of 72 for the girls, to her opening-round 71 at the Champions Course for a 2-under 143 total. Schroeder plans to join the Alabama program in the summer of 2023.

   Schroeder reached the quarterfinals of last summer’s U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship at Columbia Country Club in Chevy Chase, Md.

   Ortengren had a very efficient round as she opened with a birdie at the first hole and rattled off eight straight pars before another birdie at 10 left her at 2-under for the round. She added another birdie at the 12^th hole before her only stumble of the day, a bogey at 17, gave her a 2-under total.

   Lower Merion junior Sydney Yermish, who joined Gross in the winner’s circle at Heritage Hills last month by capturing the PIAA Class AAA girls crown, bounced back from an opening-round 78 at the Champions Course with a 3-over 75 at the Fazio Course that left her in the group tied for 31^st place with a 9-over 153 total.

   Yermish, who will join the program at the Big 10’s Michigan in the summer of 2023, made birdies at the first, fifth and 11^th holes to offset six bogeys.

   Alexa Pano, who will be a professional golfer by this time next year, added a 2-over 74 at the Fazio Course to her opening round of 3-under 69 and was alone in third place with a 1-under 143 total. Pano of Lake Worth, Fla. is No. 94 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR). Seems like ages ago that a 13-year-old Pano was the runnerup to LPGA Tour pro Yealimi Noh in the 2018 U.S. Girls’ Junior at the foggy Poppy Hills Golf Course on northern California’s Monterey Peninsula.

   Julia Misemer of Overland Park, Kan., Kary Hollenbaugh of New Albany, Ohio and Yurang Li of Fullerton, Calif. were in a tie for fourth place, each landing on even-par 144 through two rounds.

   Misemer, who will join the program at Arizona next summer, added a 1-under 71 to her opening-round 73. Hollenbaugh, who will join Lisa Strom’s Ohio State program next summer, carded her second straight even-par 72. Li, who had shared second place with Pano following an opening-round 69, struggled a little on the Fazio Course with a 3-over 75.

   Megha Ganne, the Holmdel, N.J. resident who wowed just about everybody on her way to claiming low-amateur honors in last spring’s U.S. Women’s Open at the Olympic Club in San Francisco, was lurking in the group tied for seventh place at 2-over 146 after signing for a second straight 73.

   Ganne, No. 22 in the Women’s WAGR, will join the powerful Stanford program next summer.

   Gianna Clemente, the Warren, Ohio phenom, toured the Fazio Course in 1-over 73 after opening with a 76 at the Champions Course and was in the group tied for 15^th place at 5-over 149. A Class of 2026 entry, Clemente is still almost a year away from starting high school.

   Another Jersey girl, Katie Li of Basking Ridge, was in the group tied for 45^th place at 12-over 156 after bouncing back from an opening-round 82 at the Champions Course with a solid 2-over 74 in Tuesday’s second round at the Fazio Course. Li made a strong run to the semifinals in last summer’s U.S. Girls’ Junior at Columbia.

   West Chester East senior Victoria Kim, the 2020 PIAA Class AAA champion and a Rolex Scholastic All-American award winner, added a 79 at the Fazio Course to her opening-round 83 at the Champions Course that left her in a tie for 64^th place with a 162 total.