Alexa Pano, 11, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., is the championship’s youngest competitor.
The championship’s oldest competitor is Carolyn Creekmore, 63, of Dallas, Texas.
The average age of the Women’s Amateur Four-Ball competitors is 24.66 years of age.
The team with the youngest combined age of 26 is Angelina Kim, 13, of Los Angeles, Calif. and Brianna Navarrosa, 13, of San Diego, Calif.
The team with the oldest combined age of 115 is Creekmore and Leeann Fairlie, 52, of Oklahoma City, Okla.
The team with the largest age difference of 39 years is Kim Kaul, 57, of Buffalo, N.Y., and Victoria Parker, 18, of Buffalo, N.Y.
There are 11 countries represented in the championship: Argentina, Australia, Canada, the People’s Republic of China, Chinese Taipei, Guatemala, Mexico, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the United States of America.
There are 27 states represented in the championship: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Washington. The District of Columbia is also represented.
There are six USGA individual champions in the field:
- Carolyn Creekmore (2004 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur)
- Kristen Gillman, 18, of Austin, Texas (2014 U.S. Women’s Amateur)
- Lauren Greenlief, 25, of Oakton, Va. (2015 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur)
- Mary Ann Hayward, 56, of Canada (2005 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur)
- Meghan Stasi, 37, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla. (2006, 2007, 2010, 2012 Women’s Mid-Amateur)
- Princess Mary Superal, 19, of the Philippines (2014 U.S. Girls’ Junior)
There are five USGA runners-up in the field:
- Sierra Brooks, 17, of Orlando, Fla. (2015 U.S. Women’s Amateur)
- Carolyn Creekmore (2009 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur)
- Pamela Kuong, 55, of Wellesley Hills, Mass. (2015 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur)
- Judith Kyrinis, 52, of Canada (2014 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur)
- Thuhashini Selvaratnam, 39, of Sri Lanka (2006 Women’s Mid-Amateur)
Thuhashini Selvaratnam was a member of Arizona’s victorious team in the 2007 USGA Women’s State Team Championship.
Sierra Brooks is a member of the 2016 USA Curtis Cup Team, which will compete June 10-12 at Dun Laoghaire Golf Club in Enniskerry, Ireland. Meghan Stasi played on the victorious 2008 USA Curtis Cup Team.
Mary Ann Hayward represented Canada in the 1990, 1992, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2004 and 2006 Women’s World Amateur Team Championships. Xinying Wang, 17, represented the People’s Republic of China in the 2012 Women’s World Amateur Team Championship, where she was the second-youngest player in the competition.
There are three sister teams in the field:
- Yu Chiang Hou, 15, and Yu Sang Hou, 16, of Chinese Taipei
- Jung Min Park, 17, and Sung Eun Park, 18, of San Diego, Calif.
- Nicole Whiston, 14, and Waverly Whiston, 16, of San Diego, Calif.
There is one mother-daughter team in the field:
- Julie Massa, 52, and Mariah Massa, 22, both of Holt, Mich.
Twelve intact sides competed in the inaugural U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball in 2015:
- Briana Chacon, 14, of Whittier, Calif., and Hannah Zeman, 14, of Ontario, Calif. (missed the cut)
- Shawn Farmer-Sese, 34, of Bellevue, Wash., and Christina Proteau, 33, of Canada (missed the cut)
- Kendall Griffin, 17, of Sebring, Fla., and Athena Yang, 18, of Winter Haven, Fla. (quarterfinalists)
- Carrie Hall, 53, of Hot Springs, Ark., and Julie Oxendine, 47, of Russellville. Ark. (missed the cut)
- Madelein Herr, 18, of New Hope, Pa., and Brynn Walker, 17, of St. Davids, Pa. (semifinalists)
- Olivia Herrick, 27, of Roseville, Minn., and Samantha Sommers, 27, of Saint Cloud, Minn. (lost in Round of 32)
- Mary Janiga, 19, of West Palm Beach, Fla., and Terese Romeo, 19, of Tampa, Fla. (lost in Round of 32)
- Callie Kemmer, 25, of Washington, D.C., and Alyssa Roland, 27, of New York, N.Y. (missed the cut)
- Ashley Kim, 17, of Redondo Beach, Calif., and Marni Murez, 18, of Manhattan Beach, Calif. (lost in Round of 32)
- Mari Miezwa, 36, of Brooklyn Park, Minn., and Thuhashini Selvaratnam (missed the cut)
- Brooke Seay, 15, of Rancho Santa Fe, Calif., and Carolyn Zhao, 16, of San Diego, Calif. (lost in Round of 16)
- Meghan Stasi and Dawn Woodard, 41, of Greenville, S.C. (quarterfinalists)
Sixteen players in the field hail from Florida:
- Morgan Baxendale, 17, of Windermere
- Emma Bradley, 16, of Naples
- Sierra Brooks, of Sorrento
- Charlotte Daughan, 32, of Orlando
- Kendall Griffin, of Sebring
- Mary Jane Hiestand, 57, of Naples
- Mary Janiga, of West Palm Beach
- Janelle Johnson, 19, of Royal Palm Beach
- Alyssa Lamoureux, 16, of St. Petersburg
- Hannah Leiner, 17, of Pompano Beach
- Alexa Pano, of Fort Lauderdale
- Terese Romeo, of Tampa
- Amelia Root, 16, of Jacksonville
- Meghan Stasi, of Oakland Park
- Latanna Stone, 14, of Valrico
- Athena Yang, of Winter Haven
Five sides are composed of current or former college teammates:
- Mercer University: Mary Janiga and Terese Romeo
- Oral Roberts University: Alejandra Acosta, 21, of Mexico, and Ana Torres, 22, of Mexico
- Princeton University: Hana Ku, 20, of Basking Ridge, N.J., and Jordan Lippetz, 21, of Oakland, Calif.
- Seminole State College: Janelle Johnson and Nichada Satasuk, 20, of Thailand
- Yale University: Alyssa Roland, 27, of New York, N.Y., and Callie Kemmer, 25, of Washington, D.C.
While no players will celebrate a birthday during the championship, Samantha Staudt, of Coatesville, Pa., will turn 18 on May 26, the day after the championship ends.
General Player Notes
Alejandra Acosta, 21, of Mexico, and Ana Torres, 22, of Mexico
Acosta and Torres are teammates at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Okla. Acosta, a senior, claimed her first collegiate victory in the 2014 ORU Shootout and was named 2014-15 Summit League Player of the Year. Torres goes by the nickname “Paty” and is a redshirt junior who earned WGCA All-American Scholar honors in 2014 and 2015. She is studying for her MBA after earning a bachelor’s degree in advertising.
Evelyn Arguelles, 18, of Mexico, and Isabella Fierro, 15, of Mexico
Arguelles reached the semifinals of the 2015 U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship, eliminating 2015 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball champion Mika Liu in the quarterfinals. Arguelles, who will enroll at Baylor University in the fall, grew up idolizing fellow Mexican golfer Lorena Ochoa and had the opportunity at age 7 to meet her hero at an LPGA event in Mexico. Fierro was runner-up in the 2016 Mexican Women’s Amateur Championship and finished third in 2015. She won the 2015 Mexican Girls’ Junior Championship by one stroke over Arguelles.
Morgan Baxendale, 17, of Windermere, Fla., and Emma Bradley, 16, of Naples, Fla.
Baxendale was runner-up in the 2015 Florida Girls’ Junior Championship and won the 13-15 age division in 2014. Bradley was born 14 weeks premature and weighed less than 2 pounds. In 2011, as an 11-year-old sixth-grader at Seacrest Country Day School, she became the youngest player in Florida state history to win a high school regional tournament.
Elizabeth Caldarelli, 16, of Scottsdale, Ariz., and Emily Mahar, 16, of Australia
Mikayla Fitzpatrick, 17, of Phoenix, Ariz., and Alisa Snyder, 17, of Phoenix, Ariz.
Caldarelli, Fitzpatrick, Mahar and Snyder are teammates at Xavier College Prep, a Catholic, all-female private high school in Phoenix. The Xavier girls’ golf team has won 33 state titles, with all four players helping the team take the title in 2015. Snyder earned the individual title, with Mahar (third) and Fitzpatrick (seventh) joining her in the top 10. Fellow U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball competitor Thuhashini Selvaratnam is one of the team’s coaches, and notable alumnae include USGA champions Amanda Blumenherst, Heather Farr and Grace Park. 2015 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion Hannah O’Sullivan and Cheyenne Woods also attended the school.
Erin Carney, 39, of Mission Hills, Kan., and Lacy Shelton, 36, of Overland Park, Kan.
Carney was runner-up at the 2015 Kansas Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship. She is the chief investment officer at C2FO, a financial technology company. Shelton, who qualified for match play in last year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball with partner Sarah Davison, is an avid runner, having completed two marathons and numerous half-marathons.
Carolyn Creekmore, 63, of Dallas, Texas, and Leeann Fairlie, 52, of Oklahoma City, Okla.
Creekmore was inducted into the Arkansas and Texas Golf Halls of Fame in 2010. She tore her rotator cuff in 2014 and had to take the entire year off from playing golf. Fairlie won the 1985 North & South Women’s Amateur Championship and is a three-time Oklahoma Women’s Amateur champion. She was inducted into the Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame in 2012.
Hailee Cooper, 16, of Montgomery, Texas, and Kaitlyn Papp, 17, of Austin, Texas
Cooper won the AJGA’s 2015 Bishops Gate Golf Academy Junior at Horseshoe Bay and 2014 Under Armour-Jordan Spieth Championship. Papp tied for fourth in the 2015 Harder Hall Invitational and reached the quarterfinals of the 2015 Polo Junior Golf Classic. Papp is a senior at Lake Travis High School in Austin, where one of her golf teammates is 2014 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion and fellow 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball competitor Kristen Gillman. Cooper and Papp were both members of the victorious 2015 USA Junior Solheim Cup Team.
Susan Curtin, 46, of Westwood, Mass., and Pamela Kuong, 55, of Wellesley Hills, Mass.
Curtin, a former third class petty officer with the United States Coast Guard Reserve, played college golf at Brigham Young University in 1988-89. She then transferred to the College of the Holy Cross, where she met her husband, Mike, who was co-captain of the golf team. The Curtins will celebrate their 22nd wedding anniversary on May 21, the first day of U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball competition. Kuong, a senior vice president of commercial lending at Bank of America, won the 2008 and 2010 Massachusetts Women’s Amateur championships. She is also the 2011 New England Women’s Amateur champion.
Charlotte Daughan, 32, of Orlando, Fla., and Mercedes Huarte, 30, of Argentina
Daughan owns a women’s golf accessory line called Blingo Ball Marks. Earlier this year, she teamed with Katie Miller (a U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball competitor with Kristen Obush) to win the 69th Women’s International Four-Ball Championship. She was runner-up in the 2014 Florida Women’s Amateur Championship, and with her husband, Ben, was runner-up in the 2014 Florida State Golf Association Mixed Team Championship. She was a four-time Division II national player of the year at Rollins College, where her husband also played golf. Both Daughans work at Golf Channel, with Ben serving as a producer for Golf Central and Charlotte working in customer relations for GolfNow.com. Huarte moved from Argentina to the United States to play college golf at Jacksonville (Ala.) State University, where she was a four-time Ohio Valley Conference champion and the 2008 player of the year. She is a financial analyst for Cisco Systems. Huarte is expecting her first child with her husband Corey Brindle, who served in Afghanistan with the 82nd Airborne Division of the U.S. Army.
Lauren Greenlief, 25, of Oakton, Va., and Alexandra Austin, 23, of Burke, Va.
In 2015, Greenlief became the youngest winner in U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur history, taking the title at 25 years and 25 days of age. She is a three-time Virginia State Golf Association Stroke-Play champion, winning the 2010 title on the seventh playoff hole. Greenlief, a management consultant for the Boston Consulting Group, received an exemption into the 2016 Kingsmill Championship, an LPGA Tour event. If she misses the cut, she will fly to Florida in time for Saturday’s first round of stroke play. If she makes the cut, Austin, who finished third at the 2015 VSGA Women’s Amateur, will play stroke play as a single player, and Greenlief will join her on Monday if they qualify for match play.
Shawn Farmer-Sese, 34, of Bellevue, Wash., and Christina Proteau, 33, of Canada
Farmer won the 2014 Washington State Golf Association Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship and was runner-up in 2015. Proteau, a prosecutor for the British Columbia Ministry of Justice, is a five-time Canadian Women’s Mid-Amateur champion and has won three British Columbia Women’s Amateurs and four British Columbia Women’s Mid-Amateurs. Proteau qualified for the 2011 U.S. Women’s Open at The Broadmoor. She reached the quarterfinals of the 2014 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship while six months pregnant, and all four of her matches went to 19 holes. Her son, Jameson, is 17 months old.
Kristen Gillman, 18, of Austin, Texas, and Sierra Brooks, 17, of Orlando, Fla.
Gillman won the 2014 Junior PGA Championship and was a quarterfinalist in the 2015 Polo Golf Junior Classic. She is a senior at Lake Travis High School in Austin, where one of her girls’ golf teammates is fellow 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball competitor Kaitlyn Papp. Brooks earned 2015 victories in the South Atlantic Women’s Amateur (the Sally), the Women’s Southern Amateur and the Florida State High School Class 1A championships. She was also a semifinalist in the Polo Golf Junior Classic, an event she won in 2014. In the fall, Brooks and Gillman, both members of the victorious 2014 USA Junior Ryder Cup Team, plan to enroll at Wake Forest University and the University of Alabama, respectively.
Savannah Grewal, 14, of Canada, and Amelia Root, 16, of Jacksonville, Fla.
Grewal is of Canadian, Swedish, Indian and Korean descent and is fluent in English, French and Swedish. She was captain of her middle school’s cricket team that won the Greater Toronto Championship. Root is the middle of three girls who were all adopted from the People’s Republic of China as infants. All three girls play on the same high school golf team and helped lead their team to a 10th-place finish in the state championship.
Kendall Griffin, 17, of Sebring, Fla. and Athena Yang, 18, of Winter Haven, Fla.
Griffin won the 2016 Ione D. Jones/Doherty Championship. She has verbally committed to attend Louisiana State University in 2017. Griffin and Yang, who will attend Mississippi State University in the fall, earned medalist honors in the 2015 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship and reached the quarterfinals.
Mary Ann Hayward, 56, of Canada, and Judith Kyrinis, 52, of Canada
Hayward retired in January as the manager of sports performance for the Golf Association of Ontario. The four-time Canadian Women’s Amateur champion, who earned stroke-play medalist honors in the 2015 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championship, has been inducted into the Canada, Ontario and Quebec golf halls of fame. Kyrinis, who is a registered nurse at Toronto General Hospital, won the 2015 Senior Women’s North & South Championship. She recorded a hole-in-one while 8½ months pregnant with her oldest child.
Madelein Herr, 18, of New Hope, Pa., and Brynn Walker, 17, of St. Davids, Pa.
Herr was runner-up at the 2015 Pennsylvania Women’s Amateur Championship and will attend Penn State University in the fall. Walker, an incoming freshman at the University of North Carolina, represented Pennsylvania in the 2013 and 2015 USGA Women’s State Team Championships.
Mary Jane Hiestand, 57, of Naples, Fla., and Julie Carmichael, 52, of Plainfield, Ind.
Hiestand is a five-time Florida Women's Golf Association Senior Player of the Year and a member of the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame. She met her husband, Jeff, who doubles as her caddie, at a USGA qualifier in 1997. Hiestand had the honor of hitting the first ball in competition in the inaugural U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship, conducted at Bandon Dunes. Carmichael is a healthcare and real estate executive and strategist in the Hoosier State. Along with her father,
1961 U.S. Amateur quarterfinalist and former Indiana University golf coach Sam Carmichael, she owns the Martinsville (Ind.) Golf Club. Carmichael won the 1986 NCAA Division I Women’s Golf Championship while attending Stanford University. She was inducted into the Indiana Golf Hall of Fame in 2005 and has won numerous Indiana Golf Association and Indiana Women’s Golf Association championships.
Mary Janiga, 19, of West Palm Beach, Fla., and Terese Romeo, 19, of Tampa, Fla.
Janiga and Romeo are freshman teammates at Mercer University, in Macon, Ga. Janiga’s first college win came in the 2015 Fighting Camel Fall Classic. In 2014, Romeo recorded the final hole-in-one in U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links history, acing the sixth hole at The Home Course in DuPont, Wash.
Julia Johnson, 17, of Baton Rouge, La., and Abbey Daniel, 15, of Covington, La.
Johnson, who plans to attend the University of Mississippi in 2017, is the reigning Louisiana Women’s Amateur champion. Daniel is the reigning Louisiana Girls’ Junior Amateur Champion and was a finalist in the 2015 Drive, Chip & Putt Championship. Her mother, Kay Daniel, reached the quarterfinals in the 2015 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur and is a second alternate from her qualifying site for the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball.
Kim Kaul, 57, of Buffalo, N.Y., and Victoria Parker, 18, of Buffalo, N.Y.
Kaul won the 2015 New York Senior Women’s Amateur Championship. She was a four-sport athlete as a high school student in western New York, played basketball at Canisius College and spent her career as a high school softball and basketball coach and physical education teacher. Kaul, a competitive softball player who was invited to the 1992 Olympic Trials, was inducted into the Greater Buffalo Sports Hall of Fame in 2012. Parker will enroll at Coastal Carolina University in the fall, after taking a year off between high school and college to focus on developing her game.
Hana Ku, 20, of Basking Ridge, N.J., and Jordan Lippetz, 21, of Oakland, Calif.
Ku and Lippetz are juniors on the Princeton University women’s golf team and both received second-team All-Ivy League honors in 2015. Ku won her first collegiate title in the 2015 Lehigh Invitational. She is majoring in operations research and financial engineering, and spent six weeks in Peru during the summer of 2014 with Princeton Engineers Without Borders, building a water system that brings clean water to 10 families in a mountain village. Ku grew up near Golf House, headquarters of the USGA, and spent time during her high school years as an intern for the USGA Museum. Lippetz earned her first collegiate victory in the 2014 Low Country Intercollegiate and finished eighth in the 2015 Ivy League Championship.
Alyssa Lamoureux, 16, of St. Petersburg, Fla., and Alexa Pano, 11, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Lamoureux was runner-up at the 2015 Florida Women’s Amateur Championship and won the 2014 Florida Girls’ Junior Match Play Championship. Pano is a 2014 and 2016 Drive, Chip & Putt Championship finalist. In 2016, she won the overall Girls’ 10-11 age group, placing first in driving, second in chipping and fourth in putting. In 2014, she won the chipping portion of the Girls’ 7-9 age group and placed third overall.
Hannah Leiner, 17, of Pompano Beach, Fla., and Latanna Stone, 14, of Valrico, Fla.
Leiner tied for third at the 2014 Florida State Golf Association Women’s Amateur Stroke Play Championship. In 2012, Stone became the first 10-year-old to qualify for the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship. Two years later, she reached the finals in the inaugural Drive, Chip & Putt Championship.
Julie Massa, 52, of Holt, Mich., and Mariah Massa, 22, of Holt, Mich.
The Massas are the second mother/daughter team to play in the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball, joining Martha Leach and Madison Gerstle in 2015. Julie Massa is a reinstated amateur who won the 2013 Michigan Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship. Mariah Massa just graduated from Michigan State University, where she played on the women’s golf team.
Jung Min Park, 17, of San Diego, Calif., and Sung Eun Park, 18, of San Diego, Calif.
The Park sisters both attend Torrey Pines High School. Sung Eun, who goes by the name Christina, will join the University of Pennsylvania women’s golf team in the fall. She plans to major in business at the famed Wharton School. Jung Min won the 2015 Los Angeles City Junior Championship.
Alyssa Roland, 27, of New York, N.Y., and Callie Kemmer, 25, of Washington, D.C.
Roland and Kemmer were teammates at Yale University, with Roland winning the 2010 Ivy League Championship. Roland is an investment banking associate in the financial sponsors group for Credit Suisse. Kemmer works as a consultant for Deloitte. Kemmer’s brother, Dodge, is a professional golfer who competes on the European Challenge Tour.
Meghan Stasi, 37, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Dawn Woodard, 41, of Greenville, S.C.
Stasi won the 2012 Ione D. Jones/Doherty Championship, as well as the 2010 and 2012 Florida Women’s Amateurs and 2013-14 Florida Women’s Mid-Amateurs. The four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion represented the USA in the 2015 South American Amateur Championship, where she finished eighth. Stasi and her husband, Danny, own Shuck N’ Dive, a seafood restaurant in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Woodard is a highly decorated player in the Carolinas region. In 2015, she won her sixth Women’s South Carolina Golf Association’s Amateur Championship. She also won the 2011 and 2012 Carolinas Women’s Match Play Championships, the 2010-12 Women’s South Carolina Golf Association Match Play Championships and the 2012 WSCGA Stroke Play Championship. She was the 2012 Carolinas Women’s Player of the Year.
Thuhashini Selvaratnam, 39, of Sri Lanka, and Mari Miezwa, 36, of Brooklyn Park, Minn.
Selvaratnam is the varsity girls’ golf coach at Xavier College Preparatory, a Catholic, all-female private high school in Phoenix. Born and raised in Sri Lanka, “Tui” won the Sri Lanka Amateur Championship at age 12, earning Guinness World Record recognition as the youngest player to win a national championship. She was the Arizona Women’s Golf Association Player of the Year from 2001-2010 and the Sri Lanka Sports Woman of the Year in 1997. Selvaratnam and Miezwa teamed to win the 2010, 2013 and 2015 Arizona Women’s Golf Association’s Four-Ball Championships.
Compiled by Christina Lance, manager of championship communications for the USGA. Email her at clance@usga.org.
