No. 1 seed falls; Quarterfinal matches set at PNGA Women’s Amateur
Olympia, Wash. – The quarterfinal matches are set at the 121st Pacific Northwest Women’s Amateur, hosted this week July 10-14 at Olympia Country & Golf Club in Olympia, Wash.
The rounds of 32 and 16 were held today as the region’s best players battled it out during the championship’s first day of match play.
Championship links:
No. 1 seed Victoria Liu of Vancouver, B.C. was defeated in this morning’s round of 32 match by Brooke Mahler of Buckley, Wash. After the two players tied the first three holes, Mahler won three of the next five holes to take a lead in the match and never gave it up winning the match 2&1 after 17 holes.
In this afternoon’s round of 16 Mahler faced Montgomery Ferreira of Tacoma, Wash. Mahler lost the first hole and was down the entire match before winning three of the last five holes to earn a 1 up victory on 18.
Mahler, a rising sophomore on the Eastern Washington University women’s golf team, will face off against Mafy Singson of the Philippines in tomorrow’s first quarterfinal match. Singson is ranked inside the top-1000 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR).
In quarterfinal match number two Grace Lee of Bellevue, Wash. will face Angela (Zi Lan) Zhang of Vancouver, B.C. Lee is a rising sophomore on the Gonzaga University women’s golf team and is the reigning WCC conference Freshman of the Year. Zhang played collegiately at Dartmouth University.
Lauren Sung of Palo Alto, Calif. will face Adithi Anand of Issaquah, Wash. in quarterfinal match number three. Anand is a rising junior on the University of Washington women’s golf team. Sung is a rising sophomore on the University of Michigan women’s golf team, and she defeated her twin sister Sydney Sung in the round of 16 to earn a spot in the quarterfinals.
Quarterfinal match number four will feature Yvonne Vinceri of Redmond, Ore. and Jiarui (Joyce) Jin of Newbury Park, Calif. Vinceri is a rising junior on the University of Idaho women’s golf team. Jin plays collegiately for the University of Southern California and in 2019 she won stroke-play qualifying medalist honors at the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship.
The quarterfinal rounds will take place tomorrow morning, Thursday, July 13, beginning at 7:30am followed by the semifinal matches in the afternoon. The 36-hole championship match will be contested on Friday, July 14. Each match will be contested over 18 holes, with the exception of the final match.
First held in 1899, the Pacific Northwest Women’s Amateur Championship is one of the oldest amateur golf championships in the world. Past champions include Pacific Northwest Golf Hall of Famers who made up the Golden Age of female golfers in the Northwest such as JoAnne Carner, Jo Ann Washam, Pat Lesser Harbottle, Edean Ihlanfeldt, Violet Pooly Sweeney, Marcia Fisher, and Betty Jean Hulteng, among others. Past champions also include many others who would later go on to the LPGA Tour, such as Jimin Kang, Peggy Conley, Ruth Jessen and Shirley Englehorn.
The PNGA Women’s Amateur is one of 11 major, regional, amateur championships for men, women, juniors and senior conducted annually by the PNGA throughout the Northwest.
About Olympia Country & Golf Club
The Olympia Country & Golf Club (OCGC) has a long history in Olympia. It was founded in 1917 and in 1925 the club was relocated to its current location on Butler Cove. It started as a 9-hole course and expanded to an 18-hole course in 1958. Known for its tight fairways and lightning-fast greens, the course has played host to Olympia families for generations.
