Joy-Connelly captures title in Jones/Doherty Senior Amateur; Florida's Filler the Amateur division winner

 

   It’s always worth checking in on the Ione D. Jones/Doherty Women’s Amateur Championship at Coral Ridge Country Club in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

   For those of us who follow the college scene, there’s usually someone tuning up for the second half of the season, which will get under way in earnest next month.

   Or you’ll often find some rising teen-ager who isn’t even in college yet. I’m sure the regulars at Coral Ridge got a huge kick out of seeing native South Floridian Alexa Pano, a three-time winner of the Jones/Doherty as a kid, claim her first LPGA victory on her 19^th birthday last summer in an event co-sanctioned by the LPGA Tour and the Ladies European Tour (LET) in Northern Ireland.

   It doesn’t seem like it was that long ago that Pano won the last of her three Jones/Doherty crowns as a 15-year-old because it wasn’t that long ago, just four years. She lost in the final in one last shot at a fourth title two years ago.

   And golf’s bright future was on display again at Coral Ridge as Florida senior Maisie Filler of Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. claimed a 4 and 3 victory over Scarlett Schremmer, a 17-year-old from Birmingham, Ala. who is home-schooled, in Friday’s final.

   They were the two best players in the 91^st renewal of the Jones/Doherty Amateur Championship all week with Schremmer claiming medalist honors in qualifying for match play Monday with a sparkling 3-under 69 and Filler finishing four shots behind Schremmer in second place with a 1-over 73.

   But I had a rooting interest in the 38^th playing of the Jones/Doherty Senior Women’s Amateur Championship, so I’m going to get back to the young kids later in this post.

   As a regular caddy at Stonewall, I drew Tara Joy-Connelly when the U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship came to Stonewall’s North Course in September. 

   Joy-Connelly had missed much of 2022 when a golf cart seized on her and she ended up having surgery to repair a damaged rotator cuff.

   She was Tara Joy when she starred at Miami in the 1990s and she is no stranger to the Florida women’s amateur scene as she competed in the Sunshine State while her husband, J.P. Connelly, a PGA professional, worked at clubs in the South Florida Section.

   Joy-Connelly went back home to Massachusetts when Connelly accepted the job as the head pro at The Kittansett Club on Buzzards Bay in Marion, Mass. The Philadelphia golf community is very familiar with J.P.’s dad, Jack Connelly, the longtime head pro at Huntingdon Valley Country Club and a past president of the PGA of America.

   Joy-Connelly was in the midst of playing herself back into shape when she showed up at Stonewall. Having turned 50 early in 2023, Joy-Connelly had earned a trip to the U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Waverley Country Club in Portland, Ore.

   I was really impressed with Joy-Connelly’s ball-striking and it took her all of one practice round to figure out the green speeds on the often maddening Tom Doak complexes at the North. And you couldn’t help but like the way Joy-Connelly competes.

   Rain and darkness were closing in at the end of our second round of qualifying for match play and Joy-Connelly knew, at 12-over, that she was on bubble. And she battled hard. Would have been nice if that birdie putt at 17 had taken one more roll, but she got it in at 12-over and that got her in a playoff among her and seven others for the final three spots in match play the following morning.

   After a couple of hard-earned pars (the first of her two putts for par on the second playoff hole earned shot-of-the-year honors in my year-end post a couple of weeks ago), Joy-Connelly had made it into the match-play bracket.

   Joy-Connelly’s reward was a match with one of the three co-medalists, Jackie Rogowicz, a player I had often seen when she was one of the top high school players in Pennsylvania at Pennsbury a decade ago. Rogowicz played really well and rolled to a 5 and 4 victory on her way to the semifinals.

   So yeah, as the results rolled in from Cedar Ridge and Joy-Connelly kept advancing in the Jones/Doherty Senior Women’s Amateur match-play bracket, I was absolutely pulling for her.

   And didn’t Joy-Connelly go out and win the thing, claiming a 3 and 2 victory over the defending Jones/Doherty Senior champion Shelly Haywood, a former head coach at Arizona from Laguna Hills, Calif., in Friday’s final.

   Joy-Connelly survived a couple of tough tests in match play earlier in the week, but she cruised through her final three matches to capture the Jones/Doherty Senior crown for the first time.

   The biggest moment in the final came early in the match at the third hole. Joy-Connelly, already 2-up, bunkered her approach at the third hole while Haywood was in tight with just a six-footer for birdie.

   But in a classic match-play turnaround, Joy-Connelly holed her bunker shot from 18 yards away and a stunned Haywood missed her birdie try. Joy-Connelly then buried a 25-footer for birdie at the fourth hole to put Haywood in a 4-down hole that she was never able to climb out of.

   “We both kind of traded mistakes on the first hole and I made a nice putt to win the hole,” Joy-Connelly told Gary Curreri, a freelance reporter for the Sun Sentinel who did a nice job reporting on the Jones/Doherty on the Coral Ridge website all week. “I made par on the second and on the third I made a birdie out of the sand.

   “I rolled in a 25-footer for birdie on the fourth, which put me 4-up through four. With the pins and the wind, you know you are going to lose some.”

   Haywood immediately battled back by winning the fifth and sixth holes to cut her deficit in half, but Joy-Connelly picked up wins at 10 and 12 to restore her 4-up advantage. Haywood again got back-to-back wins at the 13^th and 14^th holes to cut her deficit to 2-down with five holes to play.

   But Joy-Connelly two-putted from 20 feet to take the 15^th hole and close out the win.

   A couple of weeks after her first-round exit at Stonewall, Joy-Connelly reached the second round of match play as a senior “rookie” in the U.S. Women’s Senior Amateur Championship at Troon Country Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. before falling, 8 and 6, to a red-hot Sarah LeBrun Ingram, the captain of the last two winning United States Curtis Cup teams.

   Haywood also reached the second round of match play at Troon before dropping a 20-hole thriller to Mary Ann Hayward, a fairly legendary Canadian amateur and winner of the 2005 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship at Shadow Hawk Golf Club in Richmond, Texas.

   You could argue that the Jones/Doherty Senior division was more competitive than the amateur division. The Senior division championship bracket was 32 players while the Amateur division bracket was comprised of only 16 players.

   As Joy-Connelly alluded to, the South Florida weather in early January was typically dicey. There were some of the usual breezy conditions for Monday’s qualifying round, but Tuesday’s opening day of match play featured gusts up to 40 mph. A nice day Wednesday was followed by rainy weather Thursday when the Senior division played two rounds of matches, the quarterfinals and the semifinals.

   Joy-Connelly finished in a tie for ninth place in Monday’s qualifying for match play with a 7-over 79. Medalist honors went to Canadian Judith Kyrinis, the 2017 U.S. Women’s Senior Amateur champion at Waverley Country Club in Portland, Ore. and the runnerup to Haywood in the Jones/Doherty Senior division final a year ago at Coral Ridge. Kyrinis, the 2020 Jones/Doherty Senior winner, carded a solid 1-over 73 to claim the top seed in the match-play bracket.

   As is often the case, Joy-Connelly’s toughest two matches were her first two. She pulled out a 1-up decision over Kathy Hartwiger, the 2002 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion at Eugene Country Club in Eugene, Ore. and a legendary figure in Alabama amateur circles, in Tuesday’s winds.

    Joy-Connelly then needed 22 holes to outlast Robin Kraft in the second round Wednesday and reach the quarterfinals.

   Joy-Connelly’s quarterfinal opponent was South Florida legend Mary Jane Hiestand, who made a remarkable run to the U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur final at age 58 in 2017 at Champions Golf Club in Houston before falling.

   The Naples, Fla. resident had stunned Kyrinis, the qualifying medalist, on the 19^th hole in the opening round of match play and went 19 holes to oust Suzie Spotleson in the second round. Spotleson lists Canton, Ohio as her home town, but she maintains a membership at the RiverCrest Golf Club & Preserve and competes in Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia events.

   Joy-Connelly got in a groove in her two matches Thursday, rolling to a 6 and 5 decision over Hiestand and then cruising to a 6 and 4 victory over Kimbra Benson of Pinehurst, N.C. in the semifinals to book a spot in the final. Joy-Connelly punctuated her victory over Benson by chipping in from off the green.

   Haywood shared second place in qualifying for match play with Wendi Christensen of Coral Springs, Fla., each posting a 2-over 74 that left them a shot behind Kyrinis. Haywood opened her road to the final with a 5 and 4 victory over Judy Penman.

   Haywood faced a tough second-round opponent in Ingram, a three-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Am champion in the 1990s before rheumatoid arthritis put a stop to competitive golf for her for 20 years. But, at age 57, Ingram has rediscovered her game and had a nice summer. Haywood, however, rolled to a 7 and 5 victory over Ingram, who calls Nashville, Tenn. home.

   Haywood got a little bit of a break when her quarterfinal opponent, Jayne Pardus, came down with the flu and was forced to forfeit.

   Haywood faced another tough Canadian in Terrill Samuel, the runnerup to her countrywoman Kyrinis in the 2017 U.S. Women’s Senior Am at Waverley, in the semifinals and claimed a 3 and 2 victory to earn her spot in the final opposite Joy-Connelly.

   Alexandra Frazier, a longtime Gulph Mills Golf Club member, earned a spot in the Jones/Doherty Senior match-play bracket and was knocked in the opening round with a 2 and 1 setback at the hands of Christensen.

   In the Jones/Doherty Senior First Flight final, Adrienne MacLean of Tequesta, Fla. claimed the title with a 3 and 2 victory over Lin Culver of Palm Coast, Fla.

   In the Second Flight final, Shirley Vaughn of Pinehurst, N.C. needed 20 holes to defeat Suzanne Ricard of Parkland, Fla. and capture the title.

   Filler got the jump on Schremmer in Friday’s final of the Jones/Doherty Amateur Championship, grabbing a 2-up lead after six holes. Schremmer, however, battled back to win the next three holes, sinking a 25-foot putt on the ninth hole to take a 1-up edge.

   But Filler, who is No. 67 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR), got it going on the incoming nine at Coral Ridge with wins at the 10^th, 11^th, 13^th and 14^th holes to take a commanding 3-up lead.

   “I love competition,” Filler told the Sun Sentinel’s Gurrier. “I’m proud that I was able to stay consistent throughout the week and having good match-play strategy. Match play is so different from stroke play.

   “You just have to have a better stroke and better score than the person you are playing with. I was happy I was able to switch mindsets from the stroke play to match play.”

   Filler did a pretty good job of that last spring when she accounted for Florida’s lone point with a 1-up victory over Texas A&M’s Jennie Park in the Gators’ 4-1 loss in the Southeastern Conference Championship quarterfinals at Graystone Golf & Country Club in Hoover, Ala.

   Filler’s road to the title at Coral Ridge began with a 7 and 5 victory over Peyton Costabile, a sophomore at Towson from Canada.

   Filler, who lost to Pano in the Jones/Doherty quarterfinals in 2018, then took out defending champion Morgan Miller, a sophomore at Colorado from Cedar Park, Texas, 4 and 3, in this year’s quarterfinals.

   Filler then reached the final with a hard-fought 2 and 1 victory over Anna Ritter, a sophomore at Illinois from New Albany, Ohio. Ritter was in the lineup when the Fighting Illini claimed the first Big Ten team title in program history last spring at Fox Chapel Golf Club in the Pittsburgh suburbs.

   Ritter had defeated Sydney Grimes, a senior at Division II Barry from Suffolk, Va., on the 19^th hole in the second round.

   Grimes had opened match play by taking out 10-time Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Match Play Championship winner Meghan Stasi, 2-up. Stasi, a South Jersey native who resides in Fort Lauderdale these days, is a two-time Jones/Doherty winner. She finished in sixth place in qualifying for match play with a 4-over 76.

   It was during last year’s Jones/Doherty that the USGA announced that Stasi had accepted the assignment to be the captain for the U.S. side in this summer’s Curtis Cup Match against Great Britain & Ireland at Sunningdale Golf Club in England. Stasi, a four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Am champion, played on the winning U.S. team in the 2008 Curtis Cup Match at the Old Course at St. Andrews.

   Schremmer opened her trip to the final with a 2 and 1 victory over South Carolinian Dawn Woodard, who has teamed with Stasi in the first eight editions of the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship.

   Schremmer then rolled to a 6 and 5 victory over a pal of hers, Gabriel Albert of Delray Beach, Fla., in the quarterfinals before edging another junior standout, Kayla Bryant, a 16-year-old sophomore at FAU High in Boca Raton, Fla., 3 and 1, in the semifinals.

   Bryant was coming off a really impressive five-shot victory in the Junor Orange Bowl International Championship, which wrapped up Jan. 6^th at the Biltmore Golf Club, the Donald Ross classic in Coral Gables, Fal.

   In the First Flight final, Scarlet Weidig, a redshirt junior at Montana State from Costa Rica, claimed the title with a 6 and 4 victory over Sophia Quinones of Coral Springs, Fla.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ohio State's Hollenbaugh pulls away to claim a five-shot victory in The Sally

 

   Ohio State sophomore Kary Hollenbaugh pulled away from the field with a nearly flawless final round of 4-under-par 68 Saturday at Oceanside Country Club in Ormond Beach, Fla. to capture the title in the prestigious South Atlantic Women’s Amateur Championship, better known simply as The Sally, by five shots.

   Part of the unofficial Orange Blossom Tour, a group of amateur tournaments for women in South Florida in the winter, The Sally will turn 100 in two years. It has as much history as any women’s amateur tournament in the country.

   Hollenbaugh, an Ohio native from New Albany, entered the final round with a two-shot lead over 16-year-old phenom Gianna Clemente, who is No. 23 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR).

   Clemente, who resides in Estero, Fla., is, like Hollenbaugh, a native Ohioan from Warren and was the defending champion in The Sally. Hollenbaugh, who finished in a tie for sixth place in The Sally a year ago, was well aware what she was up against in battling Clemente.

   The forecast for Saturday’s final round was ominous and tournament officials opted for a shotgun start. But the worst of the weather stayed south of Ormond Beach and the final round was completed.

   Hollenbaugh was coming off solid fall for the Buckeyes in the first half of the wraparound 2023-2024 college season. The head coach at Ohio State is Lisa Strom, the 1994 PIAA champion as a senior at Lansdale Catholic who went on to star for the Buckeyes.

   Hollenbaugh’s strong finish gave her a 9-under 279 total for the 72-hole stroke-play event.

   Hollenbaugh opened with 1-under 71, a total she matched in a second round when the tough Oceanside layout was buffeted by some of the notorious winds that often kick up in Florida in January. Hollenbaugh carded a 3-under 69 in the third round to take a two-shot lead into the final round with her 5-under total.

   Hollenbaugh and Clemente were in the group that went off the first tee in the final round. Hollenbaugh got right to work with birdies at the first, second, fifth and seventh holes to get it to 9-under for the championship. She made a fifth birdie at the 16^th hole before giving a shot back with a bogey at 17.

   Clemente closed with a solid 1-under 71 to finish alone in second place with a 4-under 284 total. She never quite recovered from the 4-over 76 she posted in the tough conditions for Thursday’s second round.

   Clemente will be one of a dozen players who will participate in a practice session for candidates for the United States team for this summer’s 43^rd Curtis Cup Match at Sunningdale Golf Club in England. The practice session will be Jan. 19 and 20 at Seminole Golf Club in Juno Beach, Fla. and Pine Tree Golf Club in Boynton Beach, Fla.

   Virginia Tech sophomore Morgan Ketchum of Winston-Salem, N.C. finished two shots behind Clemente in third place with a 2-under 286 total.

   After struggling a little in an opening round of 3-over 75, Ketchum, the runnerup to Clemente in The Sally a year ago, signed for a 3-under 69 in Thursday’s tough conditions, the only round in the 60s for the day. Ketchum matched par in the third round with a 72 before closing with a solid 2-under 70.

   Siuue Wu, a native of Hong Kong who will join the program at Southeastern Conference power Georgia at the end of the summer, was another two shots behind Ketchum in fourth place with an even-par 288 total.

   After opening with a 1-over 73, Wu wrapped a pair of even-par 72s around a 1-under 71 in Friday’s third round.

   Mississippi senior Ellen Hume of England, winner of The Sally in 2021, and Alice Ziyi Zhao of Irvine, Calif. via China, finished in a tie for fifth place, each ending up four shots behind Wu at 4-over 292.

   Hume struggled to a 5-over 77 in Thursday’s windy conditions, but bounced back with a pair of 1-under 71s in the final two rounds.

   Zhao, a Class of 2027 competitor, was the surprising co-medalist as a 13-year-old in qualifying for match play in the U.S. Women’s Amateur at Chambers Bay in University Place, Wash. two summer ago. After struggling to a 4-over 76 in the opening round at Oceanside, Zhao battled back to 1-over with a 1-under 71 in the second round and a 2-under 70 in the third round before backing off a little with a 3-over 75 in the final round.

   It was a second straight strong showing in The Sally for Avery McCrery, a junior at Tower Hill School in Wilmington and the reigning Delaware scholastic girls state champion.

   I was a little surprised a year ago when McCrery finished third in The Sally, so I wasn’t surprised at all this year when she again found herself in contention at Oceanside before finishing in a group of four players tied for seventh place at 5-over 293, a shot behind Hume and Zhao.

   McCrery, who plans to follow the Delaware pipeline and join the program at Atlantic Coast Conference power Duke in the summer of 2025, matched par in the opening round with a 72 before struggling a little with a 5-over 77 in Thursday’s wind.

   A 3-under 69 in the third round left McCrery seven shots behind Hollenbaugh going into the final round. In that round, McCrery ripped off four birdies in a six-hole stretch from the fifth through the 10^th holes. A bogey at the 16^th hole was the only blemish on her scorecard.

   McCrery started the final round at the second hole in the shotgun start and quickly made a birdie at the third hole. She followed up a bogey at the sixth hole with a birdie at seven, but then she got on the bogey train on the incoming nine at Oceanside with bogeys at 11, 13, 14 and 15 as she finished up with a 3-over 75.

   McCrery earned a spot in the match-play bracket in the U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship at the Air Force Academy Eisenhower Golf Club’s Blue Course in Colorado Springs, Colo. last summer before falling in the first round.

   Joining McCrery in the foursome tied for seventh place at 5-over were Katelyn Huber, a Class of 2025 entry from Gainesville, Fla., Amelie Zalsman, another talented Class of 2027 competitor from St. Petersburg, Fla., and Julia Misemer, a sophomore at Pac-12 power Arizona from Overland Park, Kan.

   Huber matched par in the final round with a 72 while Zalsman struggled a little in the final round with a 4-over 76.

   Misemer, who has earned a spot in the match-play bracket in each of last two U.S. Women’s Amateurs and finished in a tie for fourth place in The Sally a year ago, closed with a solid 2-under 70.

   The two finalists in last summer’s Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Match Play Championship at Sandy Run Country Club, Meghan Stasi, who captured the title for the 10^th time, and Clare Gimpel, who has resurfaced as a junior at Division II Florida Southern in Lakeland, Fla. after spending a couple of seasons at Coastal Carolina, failed to make the 54-hole cut in The Sally.

   Stasi, who resides in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. and competes out of Tavistock Country Club when she comes home to South Jersey to compete in the Philly Women’s Amateur, is a perennial competitor in The Sally.

   But she can be forgiven if she’s a little distracted this winter. Stasi, a four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion, is the captain for the U.S. Curtis Cup team that will tee it up at Sunningdale this summer. It is Stasi that Clemente will be hoping to impress in the practice session at Seminole and Pine Tree in a couple of weeks.

   Stasi, who reached the second round of match play in last summer’s U.S. Women’s Mid-Am at the “Udder Course,” the North at Stonewall, opened with an 81 at Oceanside and struggled to an 87 in the difficult conditions of the second round before posting a solid 2-over 74 for a 242 total.

   Gimpel, who starred scholastically at Mount St. Joseph and plays out of Whitemarsh Valley Country Club, opened with a 79 at Oceanside. But she, too, struggled to an 87 in Thursday’s wind before adding an 81 in the third round for a 247 total.

   Mackenzie McCormack was a runaway winner of the Rockefeller Division of The Sally.

   Looks like McCormack might be from Jacksonville, Fla., but there was no mistaking her domination of the Rockefeller Division, which was 54 holes and concluded Friday, as she won by 26 shots.

   Not sure if the Rockefeller Division is an age or a handicap division, but McCormack sandwiched a 5-over 77 in Friday’s windy second round with a pair of 1-under 71s for a 3-over 219 total.

   Michelle Wallace was the runnerup as she added an 86 in the second round to her opening-round 81 before closing with a solid 78 for a 29-over 245 total.

   Merion Golf Club’s ageless Liz Haines, who never seems to miss a chance to tee it up in an Orange Blossom Tour event, finished in a tie for eighth place with a 258 total.

   The 70-something Haines, the runnerup in the U.S. Women’s Senior Amateur Championship in 2003, added an 88 in the tough conditions of Thursday’s second round to her opening-round 83 before finishing up with an 87.

   Less than a week earlier, Haines teed it up in the Forever 49 division of the Citrus Golf Trail Ladies Invitational at the Sun ’n Lake Golf & Country Club’s Deer Run Course in Sebring, Fla., which wrapped up on New Year’s Eve.

   The Citrus Golf Trail Ladies Invitational is the descendant of the Harder Hall Ladies Invitational, a long-time stop on the Orange Blossom Tour that was discontinued with the closing of the golf course at the Harder Hall Resort. The golf community in Sebring didn’t want to see that legacy come to an end and joined together to create the Citrus Golf Trail Ladies Invitational.

   Haines finished in seventh place in the Forever 49 Division with a 324 total. The highlight was a 1-over 73 in the third round, which, I’m fairly certain, was a round in which Haines shot her age. It’s one thing to shoot your age, but to do it in competition has to make it very special.

   After opening with an 87, Haines wrapped a pair of 82s around her third-round 73.

   Overall at Sun ’n Lake, it was an official phenom alert as 14-year-old Moroccan Sofia Cherif Essakali closed with a sparkling 4-under 68 at the Deer Run Course to claim a two-shot victory with a 6-under 282 total.

   The kid made a big splash last winter when she became, at age 13, the youngest player to make the cut in the Lalla Maryem Cup, a Ladies European (LET) stop in her native Morocco.

   Cherif Essakali opened with a 1-under 71, struggled a little in the second round with a 2-over 74, but bounced right back with a 3-under 69 in the third round before her closing 68.

   Cherif Essakali’s final round featured four birdies and an eagle at the par-4 14^th hole, where her 50-degree wedge shot from 97 yards away found the bottom of the cup. That got her to 6-under for her round and gave her a commanding lead. A double bogey at the 17^th hole dropped her back to 4-under for the round, but she had plenty of cushion to work with.

   Chloe Schiavone, a senior at Notre Dame from Jacksonville, Fla., closed with a solid 3-under 69 to earn runnerup honors with a 4-under 284 total, two shots behind Cherif Essakali.

   Thanana Kotchasanmanee of Thailand was another shot behind Schiavone in third place with a 3-under 285 after finishing up with a 1-under 71. Kotchasanmanee plans to join the program at Ivy League power Princeton in the summer of 2025.

   Angela Zhang of Bellevue, Wash. matched par in the final round with a 72 to finish a shot behind Kotchasanmanee in fourth place with a 2-under 286 total. Zhang, a Class of ’27 competitor, earned herself a spot in last summer’s U.S. Women’s Open at the iconic Pebble Beach Golf Links on northern California’s Monterey Peninsula as a 14-year-old.

   Sarah Shao of Green Brook, N.J. closed with a 1-under 71 to finish a shot behind Zhang in fifth place with a 1-under 71. Shao is another Ivy League-bound player as she will join the program at Columbia at the end of this summer.

   Angelina Tolentino, a senior at Lenape High in South Jersey, closed with a solid 2-under 70 to finish alone in eighth place with a 5-over 293 total.

   Tolentino, who will join the program at Vanderbilt in the SEC at the end of this summer, matched par in the opening round with a 72, struggled a little in the second round with a 5-over 77 and posted a 2-over 74 in  the third round before getting it in red figures with her final-round 70.

   The winner of the Forever 49 Division was Kim Keyer-Scott of Bonita Springs, Fla. as she closed with a 2-over 74 for a 13-over 301 total.

   Keyer-Scott, winner of the Forever 49 Division in the final year at Harder Hall in 2021, earned a spot in the match-play bracket in last summer’s U.S. Women’s Mid-Am at Stonewall’s North Course before falling in the first round and reached the second round of match play a couple of weeks later in the U.S. Women’s Senior Am at Troon Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.

   Keyer-Scott opened with a 4-over 76, added a solid 2-over 74 in the second round and had a 77 in the third round before her closing 74.

   Terrill Samuel, the transplanted Canadian who resides in Boynton Beach, Fla., was the runnerup as she closed with a 5-over 77 to fish two shots behind Keyer-Scott with a 303 total. Samuel was the winner of the Royal & Ancient’s Women’s Senior Amateur crown two summers ago at Royal Dornoch in Scotland.

   Martha Leach of Hebron, Ky. finished a shot behind Samuel in third place as she closed with a 2-over 74 to end up with a 304 total.

   Got a chance to watch Leach’s game as she was in our group for 36 holes of qualifying for match play in last summer’s U.S. Women’s Mid-Am at Stonewall. I was on the bag for Tara Joy-Connelly of Middleborough, Mass.

   Despite not having her best stuff, Leach earned a spot in the match play bracket at Stonewall. A couple of weeks later, Leach reached the quarterfinals of the U.S. Women’s Senior Am at Troon.