Yermish matches par again to earn a spot in match play in U.S. Girls' Junior Championship

 

   Sidney Yermish, a two-time PIAA Class AAA champion at Lower Merion, grinded out a second straight even-par 72 at the U.S. Air Force Academy Eisenhower Golf Club’s Blue Course in Colorado Springs, Colo. Tuesday to finish in a tie for eighth place in stroke-play qualifying and earn a spot in the match-play bracket in the U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship.

   Yermish, who will join the program at Big Ten power Michigan later this summer, prefers to be referred to as they/them when it comes to pronouns. Regardless, Yermish made a couple of birdies on the Blue Course’s front nine, the final nine of their round, to sneak into the top 10 after 36 holes of qualifying for match play in an elite field of junior golfers from around the world.

   The match-play draw wasn’t particularly kind to Yermish as they will face a tough customer in Wednesday’s opening round in Jeneath Wong of Malaysia.

   Wong added a 4-over 76 to her opening-round 74 to finish in the group tied for 41^st place at 6-over 150.

   Wong teed it up in the U.S. Women’s Open earlier this month at the Pebble Beach Golf Links and failed to survive the 36-hole cut with rounds of 79 and 74 for a 9-over 153 total.

   As a freshman at Pepperdine, Wong helped the Waves finish in eighth place after 72 holes of stroke play in the NCAA Championship at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. and earn a spot in the match-play bracket against top-ranked Stanford. Wong earned Pepperdine’s lone point in a 3-1 loss to the Cardinal with a victory over Megha Ganne, a member of the U.S. Curtis Cup team a year ago and one of the top freshmen in the country.

   But hey, you make the match-play bracket at the U.S. Girls’ Junior, you can expect to face a quality opponent. The level of talent gathered in the mile-high air of the U.S. Air Force Academy is sky high.

   Starting off the 10^th tee at the 6,788-yard, par-72 Robert Trent Jones Sr. design at the Blue Course, Yermish made a bogey at the 10^th hole, a birdie at 12, a bogey at 13, a birdie at 16 and bogeys at 17 and 18 to make the turn to the front nine at 2-over.

   But Yermish stayed patient and didn’t force anything, making birdies at the fifth and seventh holes and seven pars for a 2-under 34 on the outgoing nine at the Blue Course. That gave Yermish a second straight even-par 72 for an even-par 144 total that left them in the group tied for eighth place.

   Yermish had reached the U.S. Girls’ Junior as one of the four co-medalists in a Golf Association of Philadelphia-administered qualifier at The 1912 Club.

   Another one of those co-medalists, Helen Yeung, a senior at Rising Hill High School in Clarksville, Md., also earned a spot in the match-play bracket at the U.S. Air Force Academy. Yeung added a 4-over 76 to her opening round of 2-undere 70 to finish among the group tied for 15^th place with a 2-over 146 total.

   Yeung, who will join the program at North Carolina later this summer, will take on Martina Yu of Canada in an opening-round match Wednesday.

   Another opening-round match Wednesday will pit Aphrodite Deng, a 13-year-old Canadian who captured the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia’s Junior Girls’ Championship two weeks ago with an eye-popping 14-under 130 total at the Moorestown Field Club, against Tower Hill junior Avery McCrery, the WGAP Junior Girls winner in the pandemic summer of 2020.

   Deng, who listed her U.S. base as Short Hills, N.J. when she teed it up at Moorestown a couple of weeks ago, had opened with a solid 1-under 71, but struggled a little with a 5-over 77 in Tuesday’s second round to finish among the group tied for 28^th place at 4-over 148.

   McCrery, who plays out of Wilmington Country Club, captured the individual title in the Delaware scholastic championship in the spring at Baywood Greens in Long Neck, Del. She carded a second straight 2-over 74 and also landed in the group at 4-over.

   Katie Li of Basking Ridge, N.J. is coming to the end of an outstanding junior career and will join the program at Atlantic Coast Conference power Duke later this summer. Li added a solid 1-over 73 to her opening-round 76 to finish in the group tied for 36^th place with a 5-over 149 total.

   It will be a harbinger of things to come in the opening round of match play as Li will face Macy Pate of Winston Salem, N.C. Pate will be joining the program at Duke’s ACC arch-rival Wake Forest, the reigning NCAA champion, later this summer.

   Central Bucks East junior Elle Lundquist came up just short of a spot in the match-play bracket as she added a 6-over 78 to her opening-round 74 to finish just outside the cut line with an 8-over 152 total. The cut to make match play came at 7-over 151.

   Anushka Sawant, who survived a seven-for-one playoff in the GAP-administered qualifier at The 1912 Club, added a 4-over 76 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 78 and missed the cut for match play with a 10-over 154 total. Sawant is a senior at South Brunswick High School in New Jersey.

   McCrery’s Tower Hill teammate, Sawyer Brockstedt, also a junior, posted a second straight 6-over 78 and failed to reach match play with a 156 total. Brockstedt and Lundquist teamed up to earn a spot in the match-play bracket in the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship in the spring of 2022 at the Grand Reserve Golf Club in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico.

   The other two members of the foursome that shared medalist honors in the GAP-administered qualifier at The 1912 Club, Angelina Tao, a sophomore at Santa Margarita Catholic in Santa Margarita, Calif., and North Pocono senior Gwendolyn Powell, failed to earn a spot in the match-play bracket.

   Tao added a 79 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 80. Powell, who has qualified for the PIAA Class AAA Championship in each of her first three years at North Pocono, added an 81 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 80 for a 161 total.

   Powell is already a good player, but I suspect the experience of teeing it up in the U.S. Girls’ Junior will take her game up a notch.

   Marissa Malosh, a recent South Fayette graduate and a two-time PIAA Class AAA qualifier, added an 82 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 77 for a 159 total. Malosh will be a nice addition to the roster at Delaware later this summer.

   Defending champion Yana Wilson of Henderson, Nev. made five birdies in her last 10 holes on her way to a 4-under 68 to claim medalist honors with a 6-under 138 total. Wilson had opened with a 2-under 70.

   Anna Davis of Spring Valley, Calif. and No. 4 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR) had set the bar early in the day Tuesday as she added a 1-under 71 to her opening-round 68 for a 5-under 139 total. Wilson finally tracked Davis down and passed her late in the day.

   You might remember the bucket-hatted, left-handed Davis as the surprising winner of the Augusta National Women’s Amateur Championship in the spring of 2022.

   Davis’ partner in the U.S. Women’s Four-Ball at The Home Course in DuPont, Wash. earlier this year, Kiara Romero of San Jose, Calif., finished a shot behind Davis in stroke-play qualifying with a 4-under 140 total. Romero matched par with a 72 in Tuesday’s second round after opening with a 4-under 68.

   Gianna Clemente of Estero, Fla. and No. 41 in the Women’s WAGR struggled a little with a 4-over 76 in Tuesday’s second round after opening with a 2-under 70 and easily earned a spot in match play with a 2-over 146 total.

   Clemente, a native of Warren, Ohio, lost in the U.S. Girls’ Junior final to Wilson as a 14-year-old a year ago at The Club at Olde Stone in Bowling Green, Ky. Clemente teamed with Avery Zweig of McKinney, Texas to capture the title in the U.S. Women’s Four-Ball at The Home Course in the spring.

   Zweig bounced back from an opening-round 76 with a 2-over 74 in Tuesday’s second round to earn a spot in the match-play bracket with a 6-over 150 total.