Two young women golfers from Northern Ohio performed well this week at the USGA’s Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship at Grand Reserve Golf Club in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico. They each helped their teams earn a spot in the match play portion of the event, but both were eliminated by the Quarterfinals.
14 year old Gianna Clemente of Warren played with 15 year old Avery Zweig of McKinney, TX.
In stroke play, Clemente + Zweig shot 7-under par 68-69=137 to finish T6, earning the eighth seed. In the Round of 32 matches, Clemente + Zweig won in 19 holes over Michelle Ho + Michelle Woo, the 25th seed. But in the Round of 16, Clemente + Zweig lost 3 and 2 to 9th-seeded Kendall Griffin + Elle Nachmann.
Clemente and Zweig reached the semifinals in the same event last year as the youngest team in the field, before falling to the eventual champions. Clemente was the third-youngest player ever to qualify for the U.S. Women’s Amateur in 2019 when she competed at age 11.
Magnificat High School’s sophomore Cara Heisterkamp of Westlake partnered with in Puerto Rico with Vanessa Borovilos of Canada.
In stroke play qualifying, Heisterkamp + Borovilos shot 3-under par 70-69=139 to finish T12, taking the 16th seed. But in the first round match, Heisterkamp + Borovilos lost 3 and 2 to a red-hot Kaitlyn Schroeder + Bailey Shoemaker, a team that has since made it to the semi-finals.
Last August, Heisterkamp made it to the Quarterfinals at the 121st U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship at Westchester Country Club in New York.
Another Ohio team is still in the hunt for the championship. New Albany High School teammates Kary Hollenbaugh and Anna Ritter posted a pair of 70s to reach match play. They won in 19 holes in their first match. Then they rallied for a 1-up win in the Round of 16 over 24-year-old twins Jessica and Sarah Spicer, of Bahama, N.C. In the Quarterfinals, they made five birdies over the first eight holes to take a commanding 6-up lead in the quarters against No. 3 seeds Yilin (Angela) Liu, 16, of Irvine, Calif., and Charissa Shang, 18, of Calabasas, CA.
They play Thienna Huynh + Sara Im in the Semifinals today.
Last fall, the pair helped their team rally from a six-stroke deficit to win its fourth consecutive OHSAA Division I state team title.
