The Match Play is the CWGA’s oldest championship, but this year’s edition should be notable for what’s new and different.
The 102nd CWGA Match Play will be contested Monday through Thursday (July 17-20) at Buffalo Run Golf Course in Commerce City. A stroke-play qualifying round is set for Monday, and match play will run Tuesday through Thursday.
What’s significantly different this time around is the absence of Jennifer Kupcho of Westminster, who’s won the Match Play two of the last three years and was a semifinalist in 2015. Overall, she’s captured four consecutive CWGA majors (Stroke Play and Match Play).
But the No. 10-ranked women’s amateur in the world is competing in her second consecutive U.S. Women’s Open this week — she made the cut this year — and the Canadian Women’s Amateur (July 25-28) is next on the agenda.
That spells opportunity for the 35 championship flight players at Buffalo Run. None of those competitors in the open championship flight have won this title before, but that will obviously change come Thursday.
Among the top golfers entered are Colorado State University player Katrina Prendergast, who’s qualified for the 2016 and ’17 U.S. Women’s Amateur; Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Janet Moore; Mary Weinstein, the 2016 Junior Golf Alliance of Colorado Girls Player of the Year and 2017 U.S. Women’s Am qualifier; 2015 U.S. Women’s Am qualifier Erin Sargent; and 2016 Match Play runner-up Jaylee Tait.
The senior championship flight will feature a former open-division champion, 2004 winner Kim Eaton. The Colorado Golf Hall of Famer has won the senior title in this event three times (2010, ’13 and ’16). Also among the dozen seniors entered are another Colorado Golf Hall of Famer, Christie Austin, the senior runner-up last year and the 2007 champion; and 2014 winner and 2016 CWGA Senior Stroke Play champ Deb Hughes.
The open championship bracket will feature 16 players, with two rounds of match play planned for Tuesday and a 36-hole final on Thursday. The senior championship bracket will include eight competitors. Players not qualifying for those brackets — and those not playing in Monday’s stroke play — will compete in a handicap flights.
For Monday’s pairings, CLICK HERE.
