Storylines for the 12th USGA Women’s State Team Championship

Sept. 26-28, 2017 | The Club at Las Campanas, Santa Fe, N.M. mediacenter.usga.org | http://www.usga.org/womensteam | #WomensStateTeam

There are 48 three-player teams in the field, representing 47 states and the District of Columbia. North Dakota, Puerto Rico, South Dakota and Wyoming did not field teams.

Alexa Pano, 13, of Lake Worth, Fla., is the championship’s youngest competitor.

The championship’s oldest competitor is Maggie Brady, 69, of the District of Columbia.

The average age of the Women’s State Team competitors is 36.77 years old.

Delaware is the youngest team in the field with a combined age of 47: Phoebe Brinker, 15, of Wilmington; Jennifer Cleary, 16, of Wilmington; and Esther Park, 16 of Wilmington. Mississippi (combined age of 50) and Tennessee (combined age of 51) are the only other teams comprised solely of teenagers.

Illinois has the oldest team, with a combined age of 162: Hui Chong Dofflemyer, 48, of Belvidere; Char McLear, 63, of McHenry; and DeAnne Stolarik, 51, of Zion.

Field by age: Teens – 27 players 20s – 33 players 30s – 20 players 40s – 22 players 50s – 31 players 60s – 11 players

Note: While there are no age limits for this championship, players currently on a college team are ineligible to play, per NCAA rules.

There are seven USGA individual champions in the field: • Carolyn Creekmore, 65, of Dallas, Texas (2004 Senior Women’s Amateur) • Karen Garcia, 55, of Cool, Calif. (2015 Senior Women’s Amateur) • Lauren Greenlief, 27, of Oakton, Va. (2015 Women’s Mid-Amateur) • Martha Leach, 55, of Hebron, Ky. (2009 Women’s Mid-Amateur) • Julia Potter, 29, of Franklin, Ind. (2013, 2016 Women’s Mid-Amateur) • Margaret Starosto, 31, of Woodstock, Ga. (2014 Women’s Mid-Amateur) • Meghan Stasi, 39, of Oakland Park, Fla. (2006, 2007, 2010, 2012 Women’s Mid-Amateur)

Meghan Stasi (2008) is the only player in the field who has competed in a Curtis Cup Match.

Five players have won a USGA Women’s State Team title, including Laura Coble, 53, of Augusta, Ga., who has competed on three of Georgia’s four championship teams: 2005, 2009 and 2011. The other players are: Tara Fleming, 50, of Jersey City, N.J. (New Jersey, 2013); Thuhashini Selvaratnam, 41, of Cave Creek, Ariz. (Arizona, 2007); Margaret Starosto (Georgia, 2015); and Lynn Thompson, 59, of Cincinnati, Ohio (Ohio, 2003).

Susan Marchese, 56, of Omaha, Neb., is playing in her 12th USGA Women’s State Team Championship. The only player to compete in all 12 championships, she has always represented Nebraska, which posted its best finish in 1995, tying for 13th with Oregon.

There are five family combinations in the field: two mother-daughter, two sister-sister and one aunt-niece. The mother-daughter duos include: Kay Daniel, 46, and Abbey Daniel, 16, of Covington, La.; and Heidi Haylock, 45, and Ruby Haylock, 13, of Hartford, Maine. The sister combinations are: Anika Richards, 13, and Katelin Richards, 15, of Anchorage, Alaska; and Anci Dy, 14, and Anika Dy, 16, of Traverse City, Mich. Janice Calomiris, 58, of the District of Columbia, is the aunt of Julia Calomiris, 17, of the District of Columbia.

Select Player Notes, by Team

Alabama

Michaela Morard, 15, of Huntsville, is a two-time Alabama Association Girls’ Junior Amateur champion (2015 and 2017), and won the 2016 Alabama Women’s Amateur Stroke-Play Championship at age 14 to become the youngest winner in the championship’s 67-year history. A three-time American Junior Golf Association Rolex Junior All-American, she has also won three AJGA events. She plays high school softball as well as the violin and flute.

Susan West, 53, of Tuscaloosa, is a former United States Tennis Association national champion, ranking in the top two in doubles and top 10 in singles. The first recipient of the Tuscaloosa PGA Professionals of Tuscaloosa County Player of the Year Award in 2010, she advanced to the quarterfinals of the 2014 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championship.

Arizona

Kim Eaton, 58, of Mesa, is a Colorado Golf Hall of Fame member who has reached the U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur quarterfinals three times (2009, 2011 and 2014). She has won several state amateur and senior amateur titles in Arizona, California and Colorado. A retired police officer, she is competing in her seventh Women’s State Team Championship (four with Colorado and three with Arizona).

Thuhashini Selvaratnam, 41, of Cave Creek finished runner-up in the 2006 Women’s Mid-Amateur, beating Mary Miezwa in the quarterfinals, 2 up. Selvaratnam has partnered with Miezwa in the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championships. Selvaratnam is competing in her seventh Women’s State Team for Arizona and was on Arizona’s 2007 championship team. She is a native of Sri Lanka.

California

Lynne Cowan, 54, of Rocklin, has won multiple California Women’s Amateur titles, winning her third Northern California Golf Association Senior Women’s Amateur in 2017 and winning NCGA Senior Player of the Year. She has lived with ankylosing spondylitis, a form of rheumatoid arthritis, since she was 18 and has found that the motion of her golf swing helps keep her limber. She and her husband, Carl, work as independent sales representatives in the golf business. She is competing in her fifth Women’s State Team for California.

Karen Garcia, 54, of Cool, is the 2015 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur champion. A high school guidance counselor, she lost 60 pounds by following a three-year golf fitness regimen before winning the 2015 championship. Born in Wheeler, Ore., Garcia, formerly Karen Vipond, attended the University of Oregon, where she played softball for two seasons. She started playing golf at the age of 21 after graduating from Portland State University.

Colorado

Christie Austin, 60, of Denver, was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2015. She served six years on the USGA Executive Committee, and was the first woman to chair the Rules of Golf Committee and serve as a referee in a Walker Cup Match conducted in Great Britain and Ireland. In 2007, she earned Colorado Senior Player of the Year from the Colorado Women’s Golf Association after winning both the Senior Match Play and Senior Stroke Play championships. She was honored by Sportswomen of Colorado as 2007 Master Player of the Year and currently serves on the national board for The First Tee and the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame. She is one of four American females (and one of 15 women worldwide) to become a member of the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews since 2015, when the club voted to admit women.

Janet Moore, 53, of Centennial, and her husband, Kent, served as the women’s and men’s golf coaches, respectively, at Wheaton (Ill.) College from 2011-15. She has won five Colorado Women’s Stroke-Play Championships and was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2001; Kent was inducted in 2004.

Connecticut

Lisa Fern-Boros, 56, of Shelton, is a two-time Southern New England women’s champion and the step-niece of two-time U.S. Open champion Julius Boros (1952, 1963), who was also from Connecticut.

Florida

Tara Joy-Connelly, 44, of Palm Beach Gardens, was named the Massachusetts Golf Association Player of the Decade for 2000-2009 and made the semifinals of the 2014 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship. In 2015, Joy-Connelly won the Florida State Golf Association’s Women’s Amateur Stroke-Play and Women’s Mid-Amateur championships. She is playing in her 10th Women’s State Team (seven for Massachusetts, three for Florida).

Alexa Pano, 13, of Lake Worth, is the championship’s youngest competitor, and at 11 was the youngest competitor to play in an LPGA of Japan Tour event – the 2016 Yonex Ladies Golf Tournament. An eight-time winner of the IMG Junior World Championship and two-time National Drive, Chip & Putt champion (2016 and 2017), she has already played in two U.S. Women’s Amateurs, making match play in August at San Diego Country Club. In January, she led the South Atlantic Women’s Amateur (The Sally) heading into her final nine holes, and finished tied for third in the prestigious event. She was featured in the 2013 documentary “The Short Game” on Netflix.

Meghan Stasi, 39, of Fort Lauderdale, is a four-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion (2006, 2007, 2010, 2012) who represented the USA in the 2008 Curtis Cup Match on the Old Course at St. Andrews in Scotland, where she got engaged to her husband Danny on the iconic Swilcan Bridge. She also served as the head women’s golf coach at the University of Mississippi from 2000-07. A Tulane University graduate, Meghan owns a seafood restaurant in Fort Lauderdale with her husband. She is competing in her fifth straight Women’s State Team Championship.

Georgia

Laura Coble, 53, of Augusta, was inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame this year. She is also a Georgia Golf Hall of Fame member who has won the Georgia Women’s Open and is a six-time Georgia State Women’s Amateur champion. She is also the only golfer to have won the Tommy Barnes Award as overall Georgia State Golf Association Player of the Year three times and was a semifinalist in the 2016 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur. She is playing in her sixth Women’s State Team and has played on three of Georgia’s four championship teams (2005, 2009, 2011).

Margaret Starosto, 31, of Woodstock, is the 2014 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion. She was also the Women’s Mid-Amateur runner-up in 2013 (Julia Potter) and 2015 (Lauren Greenlief), making her the 12th player to compete in the same USGA championship’s match-play final in three consecutive years, joining a list that includes , Juli Inkster and Hollis Stacy. Formerly Margaret Shirley, Starosto is a former assistant coach at Auburn University, her alma mater, and is playing just two months after giving birth to her first child, a son. She was a member of Georgia’s 2015 Women’s State Team champions.

Hawaii

Patricia Schremmer, 52, of Honolulu, advanced to the semifinals of the 2017 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championship at Waverley Country Club, as well as the semifinals of the 2016 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur. Despite being afraid of the ocean, she has three daughters who surf in national competitions.

Idaho

Abby Black, 44, of Meridian, is the vice president of TitleOne Corporation and was named Idaho Business Review Woman of the Year in 2015 and made the publication’s 40 under 40 list in 2009. She was a four-time high school state tennis champion in Oklahoma and also starred in basketball, posting a 50-point game. Black serves on the board of the Children’s Home Society of Idaho and The First Tee of Idaho. She oversees an annual charity golf tournament run by TitleOne that has donated almost half a million dollars to youth organizations throughout the state.

Karen Darrington, 59, of Boise, has won 13 amateur state championships in Idaho (six Women’s Amateurs, four Senior Women’s Amateurs and three Women’s Mid-Amateurs). She is competing in her 10th Women’s State Team Championship.

Kareen Markle, 55, of Meridian, is a three-time Pacific Northwest Golf Association Women’s Mid-Amateur champion and three-time Idaho Senior Women’s Amateur champion. She is a registered nurse and also serves as a volunteer golf coach at Mountain View High School. She is playing in her eighth consecutive Women’s State Team Championship for Idaho.

Illinois

Char McLear, 63, of McHenry, is the assistant fire chief for the Barrington, Ill., fire department and a three-time Illinois Senior Women’s Amateur champion. She qualified for three U.S. Women’s Opens, and is a 42-year veteran of the National Ski Patrol. McLear serves on the board of the Illinois Women’s Golf Association and previously served on the USGA’s Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship Committee. This is her seventh time playing for Illinois in the Women’s State Team.

Indiana

Tobi Herron, 39, of Columbus, is a three-time Indiana Women’s Mid-Amateur champion and the 2015 Indiana Women’s Stroke Play champion. She also earned medalist honors in the 2004 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship at Holston Hills Country Club in Knoxville, Tenn. In the 2016 Indiana Women’s Golf Association Match Play Championship, she was playing 2017 Women’s State Team teammate Julia Potter and was 2 down after nine holes before acing the 10th. However, Potter, made a hole-in-one of her own two holes later and eventually won the match. Herron serves on three nonprofit boards and is on the finance committee of a domestic violence shelter.

Kayla Katterhenry, 22, of Evansville, graduated this spring from Evansville University, where in 2017 she was named First-Team All-Missouri Valley Conference. The 2012 Indiana Girls’ Junior champion, Katterhenry won 11 collegiate events. She is competing in her first USGA championship.

Julia Potter, 29, of Franklin, is a two-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion (2013 and 2016). She also won the 2007, 2008, 2014 and 2015 Indiana Women’s Amateur and the 2016 Indiana Women’s Open championships. She is the director of marketing for the Indiana Golf Office and was a 2008 P.J. Boatwright Intern for the Missouri Golf Association. Potter was diagnosed with scoliosis as a teenager and underwent the same back surgery as LPGA star Stacy Lewis.

Iowa

Jenny Heinz, 35, of Cedar Falls, is an assistant athletic director at Bowling Green State University. A three-time Iowa Women’s Amateur champion and four-time Iowa Women’s Four-Ball champion, she has lost 140 pounds since 2012.

Kansas

Martha Linscott, 47, of Mission Hills, served nine years on the USGA Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship Committee and three years on the Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship Committee.

Kentucky

Martha Leach, 55, of Hebron, is the 2009 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champion and the sister of six-time USGA champion Hollis Stacy. Leach introduced her sister at her 2012 World Golf Hall of Fame induction ceremony, and Leach was inducted into the Kentucky Golf Hall of Fame in 2015. She won the 2009 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur and finished runner-up in 2011. This is her fourth time competing in the Women’s State Team Championship.

Louisiana

Abbey Daniel, 16, and Kay Daniel, 46, of Covington: The Daniels are one of two mother-daughter teams competing in the 2017 USGA Women’s State Team Championship. Also a volleyball player, Abbey fractured her right arm in four places at age 14 and was told she may never be able to play golf again. A year later, she advanced to the National Finals of the 2015 Drive, Chip & Putt Championship at Augusta National Golf Club. Abbey has verbally committed to attend Mississippi State University in 2018, the same school her mother and her father, Chuck, attended. Born in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Kay is an orthodontist. The 2005 Louisiana Women’s Amateur champion advanced to the quarterfinals of the 2015 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur at Squire Creek Country Club in Choudrant, La. They also played together in the 2017 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship at The Dunes Golf & Beach Club in Myrtle Beach, S.C. Kay is competing in her seventh Women’s State Team, Abbey her first.

Maryland

Andrea Kraus, 56, of Baltimore, played on the Yale University men’s golf team until a women’s program started her junior year and she captained the team. She later earned a law degree from Columbia University. Kraus, the 2016 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur runner-up, has volunteered at a domestic violence legal clinic, and currently volunteers for an organization that provides loans to people in need. She won the Maryland Senior Women’s Amateur Championship in 2011 and 2012. In 2013, she was selected by as a Local Legend in the annual amateur edition of the magazine. She recorded a hole-in-one the day before she delivered her oldest son in 1989. She is competing in her eighth Women’s State Team Championship for Maryland.

Massachusetts

Pamela Kuong, 56, of Wellesley Hills, is the 2015 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur runner-up and the winner of the 2008 and 2010 Massachusetts Women’s Amateur championships. She is also the 2011 New England Women’s Amateur champion, and works as a senior vice president of commercial lending. She was named Massachusetts’s player of the year in 2012. She is playing in her fifth Women’s State Team for Massachusetts.

Claire Sheldon, 29, of Cambridge, is a Harvard University graduate who won the university’s Paget Prize in 2010, given to the senior student who has contributed the most to athletics. She recently started her own business, Prospective Student-Athlete College Counseling, which helps high school athletes navigate the college recruiting process.

Michigan

Anci Dy, 14, and Anika Dy, 16, of Traverse City, are one of two pairs of sisters in the field. Anika defeated Anci in the quarterfinals of this year’s Michigan Women’s Amateur Championship, 2 and 1.

Stacy Slobodnik-Stoll, 46, of Haslett, has served as head coach of the Michigan State University women’s golf team since 1997, leading the Spartans to 18 NCAA Regional appearances, 11 trips to the NCAA Championships, and six Big Ten titles, including 2017. Additionally, Michigan State has won 35 tournaments during this span. Slobodnik-Stoll is a four- time Big Ten Coach of the Year (2001, 2007, 2012, 2017) and was named the Midwest Region Coach of the Year in 1999. As a player, she has won two Michigan Women’s Amateur titles and eight Michigan Women’s Mid-Amateur titles.

Minnesota

Olivia Herrick, 29, of Roseville, has won multiple Minnesota Golf Association and Minnesota Women’s Public Golf Association championships, including the 2009 Women’s Amateur and 2016 Women’s Match-Play championships. Herrick, who serves on the board of directors of the Minnesota Golf Association, runs her own graphic design studio, and also coaches a high school varsity golf team. She made the semifinals of the 2016 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship.

Montana

Sable Kerzmann, 31, of Colstrip, is a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe, a Native-American reservation in southeast Montana. A standout volleyball player in high school, she grew up in a region where golf is rarely played. But she excelled at the game and chose golf over volleyball thinking she had a better opportunity of earning a scholarship. Her decision paid off, as she is now an emergency room nurse with no college debt. Her high school golf team won the 2004 Montana Class A championship, the only golf title in the city’s history.

Nevada

Diane Booth, 32, of Las Vegas, is a professional classical ballet dancer who has danced for 21 years. She has trained and performed with the Pennsylvania Ballet, School of American Ballet, Ballet West, Pacific Northwest Ballet and the American Ballet Theater. She performed as a showgirl in Donn Arden's Jubilee in Las Vegas and works part time as a private investigator.

New Hampshire

Betsy Knights, 57, of Hanover, is an assistant women’s golf coach at Dartmouth College. Her husband, Alex Kirk, a PGA member, is the head coach. She was a member of the U.S. Ski Team for six years and was named FIS World Cup Rookie of the Year in 1981.

New Jersey

Tara Fleming, 50, of Jersey City, played in four U.S. Women’s Opens in the early ‘90s and her former LPGA Tour caddie, Rick Kropf, has carried for her in all of her USGA championship appearances and was on her bag for her first U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur start earlier this month at Waverley Country Club in Portland, Ore., where she lost in the semifinals to eventual champion Judith Kyrinis. A Women’s Metropolitan Golf Association board member, Fleming helped New Jersey win the 2013 USGA Women’s State Team Championship, and she won the 2015 and 2017 New Jersey State Golf Association Women’s Mid- Amateurs. She played college golf at the University of New Mexico.

New Mexico

Chanet Fiorina-Trujillo, 25, of Santa Fe, is the 2011 New Mexico Women’s Amateur champion. She got married weeks before the Women’s State Team Championship to Eric Trujillo, one of the top amateur golfers in New Mexico.

Jacquelyn Galloway, 17, of Rio Rancho, is playing in her second straight Women’s State Team. She competed in 2015 with her older sister, Dominique, at Dalhousie Golf Club in Missouri, where New Mexico tied for eighth place.

Samantha Surette, 45, of Albuquerque, won back-to-back Sun Country Amateur Golf Association (SCAGA) Stroke Play Championships in 2016 and 2017 and was named SCAGA Women’s Golfer of the Year in 2016. She is competing in her first USGA championship.

New York

Ina Kim, 33, of New York, finished runner-up in the 2000 U.S. Girls’ Junior at Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club in North Plains, Ore. A native of Los Angeles, Calif., and a 2005 graduate of Northwestern University, she recently returned to competitive golf after living abroad and working in the financial industry in London and Hong Kong for 11 years. Now living in Manhattan, she won the 2016 Women’s Metropolitan Golf Association Met Amateur and Met Amateur Stroke-Play championships. She competed in this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur at San Diego Country Club, her first USGA championship since 2001 and first outside of a U.S. Girls’ Junior.

North Carolina

Courtney McKim, 27, of Raleigh, was a member of the University of Alabama team that won the 2013 NCAA Division I Women’s Golf Championship. She is a project manager for real estate and indirect sourcing for a global medical products and technologies company.

Ohio

Suzi Spotleson, 50, of Canton, Ohio, won the Ohio Women’s Mid-Amateur and Senior Amateur championships in 2017. She played softball for Northwestern University and competed in the College World Series in 1986. She is competing in her sixth Women’s State Team Championship.

Lynn Thompson, 59, of Cincinnati, is a six-time Ohio Senior Women’s Amateur winner who is playing in her first Women’s State Team since 2003, when Ohio won the championship.

Pennsylvania

Aurora Kan, 23, of Boothwyn, and Katie Miller, 32, of Jeannette, competed as a side in this year’s U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship, advancing to the Round of 32.

Rhode Island

Addy Douglas, 16, of Newport, was the medalist and champion of the 2017 Rhode Island Women’s Amateur Championship, the youngest winner in the event’s history. She also was the recipient of the National K12 Ceramic Foundation, Inc., Award of Excellence in Ceramic Art. She volunteers at a local art museum, running art camps for children.

Kibbe Reilly, 62, of Providence, is competing in her eighth consecutive Women’s State Team Championship for Rhode Island.

South Carolina

Mary Chandler Bryan, 23, of Chapin, is the sister of PGA Tour golfer Wesley Bryan, who won the RBC Heritage in April and recently made waves during September’s BMW Championship for playing his final round as a single in under 90 minutes. Mary Chandler, a former standout golfer at the College of Charleston, caddied for Wesley during the 2010 U.S. Amateur at Chambers Bay. She also serves as the videographer for her brothers’ popular trick-shot YouTube channel “Bryan Bros Golf,” which has more than 30,000 subscribers.

Dawn Woodard, 43, of Greer, is a three-time U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur medalist who has competed in 28 USGA championships. She is also a six-time South Carolina stroke-play champion, five-time South Carolina match-play champion and the 2007 Tennessee Women’s Amateur champion. She is competing in her sixth Women’s State Team and fifth for South Carolina. She played for Tennessee in 2007.

Tennessee

Jayna Choi, 16, of Collierville, is a multi-time AJGA tournament champion who advanced to the semifinals of the 2015 U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship, losing to eventual champion Eun Jeong Seong. She has verbally committed to Vanderbilt University.

Texas

Carolyn Creekmore, 65, of Dallas, is the 2009 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur champion. She was inducted into the Arkansas and Texas golf halls of fame in 2010. She served as tournament director for the George W. Bush Presidential Center Warrior Open from 2011-2013. She tore her rotator cuff in 2014 and had to take the entire year off from playing golf. She is playing in her seventh Women’s State Team, all for Texas.

Utah

Sue Nyhus, 54, of Orem, is the head women’s golf coach at Utah Valley University after previously serving as head coach at Brigham Young University. She is the only player in USGA championship history to compete in every female championship: Girls’ Junior, Women’s Amateur Public Links, Women’s Amateur, Women’s Open, Women’s Mid-Amateur, Senior Women’s Amateur, Women’s Amateur Four-Ball and Women’s State Team. She is competing in her sixth Women’s State Team Championship. Nyhus was the runner-up in the 1999 Women’s Amateur Public Links at Santa Ana Golf Club in Santa Ana Pueblo, N.M., the only previous USGA championship in New Mexico. Along with Washington’s Leslie Folsom, she is one of two players in the field who have competed in both USGA championships in New Mexico.

Virginia

Alexandra Austin, 24, of Burke, & Lauren Greenlief, 27, of Oakton, competed as a side in the past two U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championships, reaching the semifinals in 2016 at the Streamsong Resort. Austin was the Virginia Player of the Year in 2016 and holds the Radford University record for lowest career scoring average at 77.03. Greenlief won the 2015 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship at Squire Creek Country Club in Choudrant, La., becoming the youngest winner in the championship’s history. She is a three-time Virginia State Golf Association (VSGA) stroke-play champion and the 2015 VSGA Player of the Year.

Washington

Leslie Folsom, 50, of Tukwila, is competing in her ninth consecutive Women’s State Team Championship for Washington. Alongside Sue Nyhus, she is one of only two players to play in both USGA championships in New Mexico (1999 Women’s Amateur Public Links.