The comfort that comes with a 36-hole lead isn’t always a good thing. Riley Smyth battled that Tuesday at the Golfweek Carolina Country Club Amateur. She entered the day with five shots of padding over Mathilde Delavallade, her closest chaser, and ended the day with only one shot to spare.
“I think definitely part of it is coming into the final day with a comfortable lead just because you know that you have a little bit of a cushion,” Smyth said, “and it’s a little nerve-wracking knowing that you have a little bit of that pressure having to close it out.”
The Virginia junior held on, though, and a final-round 78 was good enough to maintain a 3-over total. Tough hole locations contributed to Smyth’s higher score as the course played harder all the way around on the final day.
Scores: Golfweek Carolina CC Amateur
Madison Moosa, a Furman senior, finished second at 4 over with Penn State’s Delavallade third another shot back.
No competition was guaranteed for Smyth when the ACC announced golf teams would not compete in the fall. She found tournament opportunities herself. Smyth was fourth at a Golf Coaches Association of America event in North Carolina and 11th at the Women’s Griffin Amateur.
Tournament titles are hard-fought and infrequent at this level of the sport.
“This one feels good,” she said. “I definitely haven’t been playing my best this fall, just with COVID and just trying to really hone in my game some. It definitely made it so that some of my tournaments weren’t as great as I would have liked them to be. This one felt really good just knowing that my work is paying off and that some of the changes I’m making are starting to come together.”
Smyth had a breakout week in early August when she finished T-5 in stroke play at the U.S. Women’s Amateur, then battled all the way to the match-play quarterfinals. She walked away knowing she could compete with the best in the world. That realization is invaluable.
Smyth, an economics major at Virginia, spent much of her summer eating up whatever self-improvement titles she could find, often recommended by her Virginia coaches. Right now, she’s working through The Obstacle is the Way, a title former world No. 1 Rory McIlroy raved about earlier in 2020. With school in session, it’s slower going.
“I’m liking it so far,” she said. “We’ll see how the rest of it progresses.”
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