Former No. 1 Stacy Lewis, a Toledo native, will host the event.
For the past 40 years the LPGA has staged an event in Toledo, Ohio. That will change in 2025, as a new dual event featuring the Epson Tour and Legends of the LPGA comes to the northwest Ohio community, the tour has announced.
Former No. 1 Stacy Lewis, a Toledo native, will host the event.
“It’s an honor to lend my name to this event and keep professional golf and the LPGA in Toledo,” said Lewis, a 13-time winner on the LPGA and two-time Solheim Cup captain.
“Most importantly, this event will celebrate our past while preparing our future stars for the LPGA Tour. In addition to the 54-hole tournament, we plan on having events for the Legends players to spend time with the Epson Tour players to take advantage of a great mentorship opportunity. We hope the relationships extend far beyond the week of the tournament. The new event is also a fantastic opportunity for the wonderful golf fans in the Toledo area to come see some familiar faces from the past 40 years.”
Morgan Pressel lines up a birdie putt on the first playoff hole during the final round of the Jamie Farr Owens Corning Classic at Highland Meadows Golf Club on July 5, 2009 in Sylvania, Ohio.
The Jamie Farr Toledo Classic first launched in 1984. Actor Jamie Farr of “M*A*S*H” fame had his named attached to the tournament until 2012. Seri Pak is a five-time winner of the event. Lydia Ko is one of three players who have won it twice. The event has been contested at Highland Meadows Golf Club since 1989 and has raised $14.3 million for 215 Toledo area children’s charities.
Thailand’s Chanettee Wannasaen won the 2024 edition.
A decade ago, the Chico’s Patty Berg Memorial brought members of the Epson Tour and Legends together for a similar event at Cypress Lake Country Club in Fort Myers, Florida.
“After 40 years, we thought it was time to try something different that will bring back many of the players that have competed in Toledo over the years along with the up-and-coming future stars of the LPGA,” said tournament director Judd Silverman, who founded the event back in 1984.
“We’re incredibly grateful to Stacy for agreeing to serve as tournament host. Her exceptional leadership has been on full display the past two years as captain of the U.S. Solheim Cup team. Her presence will be a huge benefit to the younger Epson Tour players.”
The field will feature 102 Epson Tour players and 42 LPGA Legends players who will play with their respective tours for the first two rounds. Following the 36-hole cut, for the final round, the tours will be integrated. An official name for the tournament and purses will be announced at a later date.
On the Epson Tour, she was reminded that she plays golf because she loves the game, at any level.
Lauren Stephenson tied for eighth at the inaugural LPGA Q-Series in 2018 and began her professional career alongside the best in the world. That’s what made going down to the Epson Tour for the first time in 2024 a “terrifying” prospect.
“Almost makes you feel like a failure when you’ve started at the top,” she said.
What Stephenson found on the developmental circuit, however, was refreshing. She knew a lot of people but met new faces as well and found the tour quite welcoming.
“Epson is kind of more of a family environment,” said Stephenson. “Everyone knows they need each other to get through the season.
“The people are what make it fun.”
Lauren Stephenson celebrates earning her 2025 LPGA card. (Epson Tour photo)
Success is also fun, and Stephenson enjoyed a lot of that on Epson, clinching her first professional title at the Twin Bridges Championship along with eight additional top-10 finishes to win Epson Tour Player of the Year honors.
On the Epson Tour, Stephenson, who played college golf at both Clemson and Alabama, was reminded that she plays golf because she loves the game, at any level.
“It was a good lesson for me,” said Golfweek’s 2018 College Player of the Year.
Stephenson, 27, met husband Kyle Morris when his parents hosted her at the 2020 U.S. Women’s Open in Houston. Morris was working on a master’s degree at the time in Atlanta and was home for Christmas. The couple wed in October 2023 and honeymooned in Cabo after Q-Series, where Stephenson tied for 27th. She had status for 2024, but not enough to put together much of a schedule.
Early on in 2024, she chased Monday qualifiers before deciding midway through the year that she needed to invest fully in Epson and it paid off.
Now, with her card secured for 2025, Stephenson can enjoy the longest offseason of her professional career before starting her sixth year on the LPGA. In addition to her victory at the Twin Bridges, she finished runner-up twice and led the tour with $136,025 on the season. She also led the tour in putts per green in regulation and rounds in the 60s. She finished third in scoring with a 69.73 average.
“I think when you’re struggling and watching your friends succeed, or people you grew up playing with – like Lilia (Vu) winning all the time – you just want so badly to be in that position,” said Stephenson, who at one time owned the NCAA scoring record for Division I.
“When you are kind of in that position of finishing No. 1 or winning on Epson, none of it changes your life. My Monday is still the same. It’s great because I’m proud of myself … but I’m still the same person.
“I think realizing that was a good mindset shift for me.”
The letter, which was obtained by Golfweek, states that “it is essential for the integrity and fairness of women’s golf to have a clear and consistent participation policy in place based on a player’s immutable sex.”
Signed by current and former female professionals, the letter was sent just before the start of the first stage of LPGA Qualifying in California last August. Just three days prior, the tour sent out a memo of its own to LPGA and Epson Tour players regarding its Gender Policy.
Golfweek confirmed that in the memo, LPGA Commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan stated that the tour planned to conclude a lengthy review of its current policy by year’s end and would implement any updates to the policy before the 2025 season.
The commissioner stated that the tour’s top priority must be to have a policy that provides for fair competition and considers “first and foremost” competitive advantage.
Meanwhile, as the tour continues its review, Davidson marches on.
Transgender golfer Hailey Davidson. Photo by Hailey Davidson
On Tuesday in Venice, Florida, she opened what was formally known as Stage II of LPGA Qualifying with a 6-over 78. If Davidson completes all four rounds of this week’s event at Plantation Golf and Country Club, where there is no cut, she will earn Epson Tour status for the 2025 season. If Davidson finishes in the top 35 and ties among the field of 195, she’ll move on to Final Qualifying for a chance to earn an LPGA card for next season.
In 2010, the LPGA voted to eliminate its requirement that players be “female at birth” not long after a transgender woman filed a lawsuit against the tour.
Recently retired LPGA player Amy Olson believes the tour should return to requiring that athletes be female at birth.
“I would say I’m cautiously optimistic that the LPGA will do the right thing,” Olson told Golfweek. “That they will update their policy to reflect a fair competitive environment for women and also continued opportunity for women.
“I am optimistic. The LPGA has fought so hard for women golfers for over 70 years – our mission has always been consistent.”
While the threat of another lawsuit undoubtedly plays a large role in decision-making, Olson has noted that the threat works both ways. Should a transgender woman earn an LPGA card and replace a biological female, the threat of a lawsuit against the tour could be just as strong.
“I so strongly believe that if the LPGA does the right thing,” said Olson, “they will have an immense amount of support.”
The letter sent by the Independent Women’s Forum lays out a number of differences between biological males and females that impact golf, noting that, “The male advantage in driving the ball is estimated around a 30 percent performance advantage; this is an enormous difference in the context of sport. Anatomical differences between males and females affect clubhead speed and regulating consistency at ball contact. Females have higher mean heart rates and encounter greater physiological demands while playing, especially at high altitudes. The anatomical differences are not removed with male testosterone suppression. There is no way to turn a male into a female. Being a female is not equated to being male with a reduction in strength.”
On Sept. 24, 2015 – a date that’s tattooed on her right forearm – Davidson began undergoing hormone treatments and in January 2021, underwent gender reassignment surgery, a six-hour procedure that’s required under the LPGA’s Gender Policy.
LPGA veteran Sarah Kemp knows Davidson personally and sees no reason for the tour to change its policy.
“I can’t imagine having to deal with the amount of hate she does on an everyday basis. It’s cruel and shameful,” Kemp told Golfweek in an email exchange earlier this year. “Hailey just wants to compete, and she works her tail off to get better. But even as hard as she works, she hasn’t been able to break through in women’s professional golf. I still can’t believe the worldwide uproar over her winning an NXXT event. … I know two transgender golfers – both of whom have had the procedure, including Hailey – and what that surgery did to their bodies physically was substantially more severe than hormone treatments alone. I believe this will be a major consideration in the research that’s just beginning on transgender athletes in elite sport.”
Earlier this year, Davidson came within one spot of qualifying for the 79th U.S. Women’s Open, the biggest championship in women’s golf.
Davidson had primarily competed on NXXT Golf until the Florida-based mini tour announced in March – on International Women’s Day – that competitors must be a biological female at birth to participate.
A three-time winner on the tour, Davidson ranked second on the mini tour’s season standings at the time of the ban. She had played nine times this season on the NXXT.
(Editor’s note: Although Golfweek obtained the letter from the Independent Women’s Forum, the list of signed names was not attached.)
“This morning I was crying because there was so much pressure.”
SOUTH BEND, Ind. – Yahui Zhang knew Sunday morning when she arrived at South Bend Country Club that she and the other 60 golfers in the final round of the Epson Tour’s $262,500 Four Winds Invitational were in for a long day.
When the ups and downs of the roller-coaster final round, particularly on the back nine holes, finally concluded, it was the 18-year-old Epson Tour rookie from China who went home with the winner’s check of $39,375.
Zhang earned her first Epson Tour victory when she sank a nine-foot birdie putt at the upfill 478-yard, par-5 18th hole to complete a three-over round of 75 that left her with a six-under total of 210, good for a one-stroke victory over Spain’s Fatima Fernandez Cano, who at times had a piece of the lead on the back nine, and Lauren Stephenson of Lexington, S.C.
“Actually I was pretty nervous coming to 18,” Zhang said after making the winning putt and then celebrating with her caddie father and mother watching in the gallery. “But I just decided I had to do what I needed to do —– I needed a birdie to win.”
After hitting her first two shots to the uphill hole short of a fronting greenside bunker, Zhang hit a long chip onto the putting surface which stopped nine feet from the pin. She then made the putt, sending Cano, who had matched par 72 two groups before, and Stephenson, who finished off a two-over 74 with a birdie at 18, to their cars to begin their 110-mile drives to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport for a flight to the next weekend’s Epson Tour Guardian Championship at Prattville, Ala.
“This morning I was crying because there was so much pressure,” said Zhang, who entered the day at nine-under 135 after opening rounds of 67 and 68 and with a one-stroke lead over playing partner, 26-year-old Brooke Matthews of Rogers, Ark., looking for her initial Epson Tour victory. In her previous 10 events this season, Zhang had six Top 10 finishes, but none got her to the winner’s circle.
So you can understand the pressure and it didn’t ease up when the Zhang family arrived at South Bend Country Club three hours before her 1 p.m. tee time. When they exited their car, they felt what Mother Nature had in store for Yahui and the rest who made Saturday’s cut at two-over 146.
“My coach called me from China this morning and told me not to be nervous,” Zhang said. “But when I got here, I saw the sun and the clouds getting big, and the wind kept getting bigger and bigger.”
The Four Winds — from the north, south, east and west — have different symbolism to the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians, whose area casinos have been the principal sponsor of this LPGA Epson Tour event for 13 years. What Zhang, her family and the rest of the field would feel all day were winds from a different direction —the north-northwest, gusting sometimes over 20 miles per hour.
Those winds made for trying conditions at the par-72, 6,414-yard South Bend Country Club, which sits eight miles west of the Notre Dame campus on South Chain Lake. Not only was every drive, every approach and every putt on the rolling and hilly 106-year-old George O’Neil design affected, but every golfer’s nervous system rode the winds’ roller coaster as well.
Yahui Zhang accepts her trophy for winning the Epson Tour’s Four Winds Invitational at South Bend Country Club on Sunday, Sept. 1, 2024, in South Bend.
)MICHAEL CLUBB/SOUTH BEND TRIBUNE)
Zhang first rode it over a four-hole stretch beginning with the par-3 fourth hole where she made bogey. She followed with a birdie at the par-5 fifth and then bogeyed the sixth before making birdie at the par-5 seventh. But then she opened the door for Cano and others when she double-bogeyed the par-4, 316-yard ninth hole with its treacherous sloping green where one golfer this week actually five-putted after reaching it in regulation.
Now at seven-under, Zhang was suddenly tied with the 28-year-old Cano, a Spaniard who has two previous Epson Tour victories in a six-year professional career and this year had two Top 10 finishes, including a solo third at the Twin Bridges Championship July 19.
Zhang and Cano would trade the lead a couple of times on the back nine — Zhang bogeyed holes 13 through 15 to fall to five-under while Cano bogeyed Nos. 16 and 17 to fall to five-under heading to the par-5 18th. But she could only match par on the hole and then waited along with the 27-year-old Stephenson, who got to eight-under after a birdie at one but shot a three-over 40 on the front nine to fall back to four-under before her closing birdie at 18 had her, too, hoping for the playoff that never came. Their bank accounts still increased by $21,887 for the T2 finish.
“This gets me closer to playing the LPGA Tour next year,” said Zhang, who became the 15th winner on the Epson Tour this season (there have been no repeat winners) and now leads with $110,042 in earnings and the Race for the Card with 1,360.316 points. Stephenson is second in both categories with $100,356 in earnings and 1,336.083 points.
Tied for fourth Sunday at four-under 212 were the 26-year-old Matthews, who ballooned to a four-over 76, and 22-year-old Annabelle Pancake, a Zionsville, Ind., golfer who recently completed her playing career at Clemson. Pancake shot the day’s best round — a three-under 69, one of four sub-par rounds on the windy day — to leap into contention. She and Matthews both received checks for $12,956.
Two golfers with Notre Dame ties — 23-year-old Lauren Beaudreau and 34-year-old Epson Tour veteran Becca Huffer — also received nice checks thanks in part to their Friday opening rounds of four-under 68.
Beaudreau, who won her first professional event, the Illinois Women’s Open back in July, finished tied for sixth in her first Epson Tour event, shooting a final-round, one-over 73 which left her tied at three-under 213 with tour veteran Savannah Vilaubi (75). They both earned $8,771.
“I played really solid all three days,” Beaudreau said. “Today we had the toughest conditions, but I played really well on these fast greens with it being really windy. I’ve been playing well the last couple of weeks.”
Huffer, who was runner-up a year ago here and earned her LPGA playing privileges at Q-School last fall, finished tied for 18th at one-over 217 after closing with a three-over 75 following a disappointing Saturday 74. She nevertheless earned a check for $3,481.
“I’m working on a couple of things, and it was not my best golf the last couple of days,” Huffer said. “It was kind of messy for me, some tough conditions and I didn’t hit it in the right spots.”
Here are some important points as the Tour Championship is less than 100 days away.
In just three months, the Coachella Valley’s newest professional golf tournament will come to town.
That will be the Epson Tour Championship, the season finale for the LPGA’s developmental tour. At the end of the 72-hole tournament at the Indian Wells Golf Resort, 15 golfers will have earned at least some playing privileges on the LPGA for 2025.
Followers of the LPGA may have some understanding of the Epson Tour and what it offers, but casual golf fans might not know much about the developmental tour. Here are some important points as the Tour Championship is less than 100 days away on Oct. 3-6.
It’s an international tour
Jessica Porvasnik (right) discusses strategy with caddie Sam Geise on the 10th tee during the final round of the Epson Tour’s Atlantic Beach Classic on March 23, 2024, at the Atlantic Beach Country Club in Neptune Beach, Fla.
Yes, it is based in the United States, but so is the LPGA itself, and the LPGA features top women players from around the world. The same is true of the Epson Tour. Of the top 15 players at the top of the Race for the Card at the moment, only five are from the United States. The top two players in that chase right now, Fiona Xu and Cassie Porter, are both from New Zealand, a country growing in importance in women’s golf. Other countries represented in the top 15 at the moment are Taiwan, China, South Korea, South Africa, Colombia, the Netherlands and Slovenia.
The tour is in its final chase for 2024
Karen Chung of Budd Lake, N.J. tees off during the final round of the Epson Tour’s Atlantic Beach Classic on March 23, 2024 at the Atlantic Beach Country Club in Neptune Beach, Fla.
The Epson Tour has played 11 tournaments so far this year, meaning there are only seven regular season events remaining before the Tour Championship in Indian Wells. The Epson golfers will play twice in July, twice in August and three times in September. Those final tournaments will take golfers across the country, with starts in Connecticut, New York, Oregon and Indiana before two starts in Alabama.
There are past LPGA players nearing a return
Kim Kaufman at the Four Winds Invitational at Blackthorn in South Bend, Indiana. (Tribune photo/Matt Cashore)
The Epson Tour is not just about college players looking for their first taste of professional golf or international players looking to break through in the United States. Just like on the PGA Tour with the Korn Ferry Tour, there are golfers who are working on the Epson Tour to return to the LPGA. That list includes a player like Kim Kaufman, ranked 422nd in the Rolex World Ranking, currently 173rd in the Race to the CMW Globe on the LPGA Tour and third in the Epson Tour Race for the Card. As recently as 2019, Kaufmann played in 21 events on the LPGA, though she has played only a handful of events on the LPGA in recent years. At third in the Race for the Card, Kaufmann has a strong chance of returning to the LPGA in 2025.
The West Coast swing is over, and the tour is up north
Battle Creek’s Lauren Reed at the Epson Tour 2024 FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship at Battle Creek Country Club on Tuesday, June 4, 2024.
The Epson Tour played two events in Arizona, one in Utah and one in California earlier in the year. The California event was played in Beaumont at the Morongo Golf Club at Tukwet Canyon. The IOA Championship presented by Morongo Casino was traditionally played the last week of March but moved to the last weekend in April. Juliana Hung of Taiwan won the title in a rout, shooting 21-under par for the 54-hole event for a nine-shot victory over current points leader Fiona Xu. If you are looking for someone with success near the desert, Hung is the player. But the tour is Milfor, Connecticut, next before a stop in New York.
The Tour Championship has some differences
The par-3 17th hole at the Indian Wells Golf Resort in Indian Wells, California. (Photo: Jay Calderon/The Desert Sun)
The tournament at Indian Wells Golf Resort’s Player Course will be a 72-hole event, rather than the 54 holes played at other Epson Tour events. And while the purse for the Tour Championship won’t be the largest on the tour – still $287,500 – the key is the Tour Championship will offer 650 points to the winner. The other Epson Tour tournaments offer 500 points to the winner. So getting into the Tour Championship and having a great week could move a player up into the top 15 where playing exemptions for the 2025 LPGA Tour are available.
“This is the golf tournament that celebrates people who have worked in the golf industry,” said White.
Allie White wears a name tag that simply says – Golf Pro. Technically, she’s the director of golf at Lancaster (Ohio) Golf Club, but that title feels a bit too much for the self-deprecating White, whose first job in the game was at the snack bar, that is until someone realized she was the one burning the hot dogs. That’s when she joined the grounds crew.
“I was totally that person who took a nip out of the fringe,” she confessed.
White’s longest job in the game, however, was that of touring pro, and most of her time was time was spent grinding on the Epson Tour, the developmental circuit of the LPGA. A veteran of more than 200 pro golf events, White quit playing the tour full-time after the 2022 season, yet now finds herself teeing in it up June 19-23 in her first KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sahalee Country Club in in Sammamish, Washington.
White, 34, won the 2023 LPGA Professionals National Championship in a playoff on the River Course at Kingsmill Resort to earn her spot in the LPGA’s second-longest running tournament. Of the 156 players at Sahalee, there will be eight PGA/LPGA professionals that make up the Corebridge Financial PGA Team. White, a veteran of two U.S. Women’s Opens, is the only one in the group making her KPMG Women’s PGA debut.
“This is the golf tournament that celebrates people who have worked in the golf industry,” said White. “I have mostly dabbled, but it’s been a lot of dabbling.”
Former Epson Tour pro Allie White poses at the pro shop counter at Lancaster Golf Club, where she’s now director of golf. (courtesy photo)
Other members of the team include Wendy Ward, a four-time winner on the LPGA competing in her 19th career KPMG Women’s PGA and first since 2013. Ward, 51, now works as a golf instructor at Manito Golf & Country Club in Spokane, Washington.
She’s joined by Kim Paez of Peoria, Arizona; Samantha Morrell of Naples, Florida; Allie Knight of Knoxville, Tennessee; Stephanie Connelly-Eiswerth of Fleming Island, Florida; Sandra Changkija of Kissimmee, Florida; and Jennifer Borocz, also of Kissimmee, Florida.
The tournament has changed dramatically since Ward last played. It’s now been 10 years since KPMG, the PGA of America and the LPGA came together to recreate what was formerly known as the LPGA Championship, an event first won by Beverly Hanson, who was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame earlier this week.
Hanson won the inaugural LPGA Championship in 1955 at Orchard Ridge Country Club in Fort Wayne, Indiana, defeating Louise Suggs, 4 and 3, in the championship match.
The greatest champions in the women’s game have hoisted the KPMG Women’s PGA trophy, including Mickey Wright, Betsy Rawls, Kathy Whitworth, Nancy Lopez, Juli Inkster, Laura Davies and Annika Sörenstam.
Three-time winner Inbee Park qualified for the LPGA Hall of Fame the last time the KPMG was held at Sahalee in 2016, when a then 18-year-old Brooke Henderson defeated 19-year-old Lydia Ko in a playoff.
Since 2015, the KPMG Women’s PGA has been a driving force for all LPGA majors as it raised the bar with iconic venues and massive purse increases.
“They want to just make it the best event we have,” said KPMG ambassador Stacy Lewis a decade ago.
That commitment never wavered, and White will get a chance to see it firsthand when she arrives in Washington. Actually, White finds that she views tournaments from a completely different lens these days now that she’s wearing a “Golf Pro” tag.
“I’m sure I’ll get to Sahalee,” she said, “and be like ‘Wow, these golf carts are unbelievable. Whoever power washes these things really does a great job.’ ”
White, one of the game’s great characters, played collegiate golf at the University of North Carolina and later served as a graduate assistant women’s coach at Ohio University while pursuing a Master’s degree in journalism.
Growing up, White played a lot of solo golf as a kid. The golf course is less peaceful these days as she manages a crew of employees, charity outings and member leagues.
“Usually if I’m going to sneak in nine holes, it’s kind of at the end of the day and the sun is going down,” she said. “I know the cart kids are cleaning and it’s just you and the course and the serenity of the game.”
Tim White caddies for his daughter, Allie White, at the U.S. Women’s Amateur.
Those who have followed White’s career know of her ubiquitous Ohio Farmer trucker hat, which she’ll most certainly don at the KPMG. The Ohio Farmer is actually a former magazine, “Farm Progress’s Ohio Farmer Magazine,” now website, that her father served as editor over for 30 years.
She’ll also be wearing the Lancaster logo, which will no doubt be confused with Lancaster Country Club in Pennsylvania, site of the recent U.S. Women’s Open won by Yuka Saso.
White’s Lancaster, a Donald Ross redesign that opened its first nine holes in 1909, was once a struggling private course that’s now open to the public.
The members and staff at Lancaster are pumped about White’s KPMG debut. Her two goals for the week are to “stay really patient and try to breathe a lot.”
Allie White and her dog, Finley, at her family farm in Ohio. (Allie White)
White said she ultimately stopped playing professionally full-time because she was emotionally worn down from the travel and wasn’t as energetic and flexible as she’d been in her 20s.
“I still feel like I can go play great golf,” she said, “but can I do it five weeks in a row in someone else’s bed?”
White’s jobs in the industry have ranged from driving the beverage cart, to waitressing at Chapel Hill Country Club to taking personalized golf ball orders in a call center cubicle.
This latest job in her hometown of Lancaster, 15 minutes from the family farm, created a path that led to a start in a major championship with an eight-figure purse.
The Golf Pro has come a long way since burning the hot dogs.
Every player on the LPGA has a story, but few had one like Haley Moore.
Every player on the LPGA has a story, but few had one like Haley Moore. The hero of the 2018 NCAA Championship, Moore overcame childhood bullying to reach the biggest stage in golf. Friends and strangers alike came together on GoFundMe to help an inspirational Moore chase her dream.
Now, after several seasons of grinding on both the LPGA and Epson Tour, 25-year-old Moore’s path has taken a detour.
“These last couple years, I didn’t have my best stuff,” said Moore from her new digs in Tucson, Arizona.
Last week, Moore began working full-time as an assistant pro at Canoa Ranch Golf Club in Green Valley, Arizona. She plans to become a PGA member and work her way into teaching. She’s especially excited about working some upcoming junior camps.
Haley Moore hugs the NCAA trophy. (Photo courtesy of Michele Moore)
Moore hasn’t completely shut the door on getting back to the LPGA, but she’s excited about sprinkling in some Cactus Tour events and state opens in the coming years. Maybe there’s a start in the KPMG Women’s PGA in her future through the teaching division.
Moving back to Tucson was an easy decision for Moore after her playing days at the University of Arizona. The nearly 6-foot-2-inch Moore graduated from college at the age of 20 and advanced through LPGA Q-School in December 2019, beginning her professional career in the midst of a global pandemic.
She made five cuts in 12 starts in 2020 and had a second rookie season in 2021, which didn’t go much better. Moore finished 142nd on the LPGA money list that season and began toiling on the Epson Tour the following year.
“Even though she always said ‘No, I’m fine, I’m fine,’ ” said Moore’s mother, Michele, “ there was just something in her head, and we were just never able to figure that out.”
Over the next two seasons, Moore made only 10 cuts on the Epson Tour, with her 2023 season coming to an abrupt end with a back injury. She made only $18,735 in official money on the Epson Tour, and the financial stress took its toll.
In 2024, Moore played the Casino Del Sol Golf Classic in Tucson on a sponsor exemption for her only start on the Epson Tour this season, missing the cut.
“The last couple years, I felt like I was doing well in the practice rounds – hitting the ball great – and then when the tournament days came, it’s not like I froze up, but I think it’s an actual competition, you’re worried. You have to perform and make the cut to make money – losing $2,000, $2,500 every week because of expenses.”
Figuring out to block out the stress of money in the heat of competition was something Moore never quite conquered. Eventually she thought, I can’t keep going on like this.
And so, it’s with a mixture of sadness and excitement that Moore enters a new chapter. Already, quite a number of people who have come into the pro shop at Canoa Ranch have recognized Moore from her time as a Wildcat and on the LPGA.
“She’s a freaking legend in Tucson,” said Michele. “We’re on campus for five minutes and she’s recognized. People literally kiss her feet.”
Haley Moore and her mother, Michele, pose with their artwork, a recent hobby for the pair. (courtesy photo)
When Moore was a rookie on the LPGA, the tour created a 30-second video spot on her as part of its Drive On marketing campaign, along with first-person accounts written by Moore and her mother.
“Being bigger, stronger and better than boys on the soccer field didn’t make me popular when I was a kid,” Haley wrote. “Continuing to grow didn’t put me in the popular girls’ club, either. Throughout my school years, I heard every taunt and laugh; I endured every insult and rejection. I tried to brush it off.”
As a pro, Moore created a foundation to help end bullying. Once she gets settled into her new role at Canoa Ranch, she’d like to continue those efforts.
Little did Hung know how important that finale would become.
When Taiwanese golfer Juliana Hung holed out from 70 yards away on No. 18 during her second round of the Inspirato Colorado Women’s Open, little did she know how important that finale would become.
Hung’s eagle gave her a one-stroke advantage heading into what was expected to be a wild final round of the tournament at Green Valley Ranch Golf Club.
But when a freakish hail storm pounded the Denver golf course on Friday, organizers had to cancel the final round, meaning that Hung edged Dana Fall by one stroke to take the top prize of $100,000.
Because of this hailstorm, the Green Valley Ranch Golf Club tells us their final round of the Colorado Women’s Open Golf Tournament is canceled. Some good news: the awards ceremony will still be held at 9:30am and driving range opens at noon. Full story at 9:00am. pic.twitter.com/DnHkpIDVOU
General Manager of Green Valley Ranch Golf Club Matt Bryant met up with CBS Colorado Traffic Reporter Brian Sherrod to discuss the impact from the hailstorm. Bryant says the hail started hitting the field around 10 p.m. Thursday. It left hundreds to thousands of dents on the field, causing them to cancel their Colorado’s Women’s Golf Tournament.
Bryant tells CBS Colorado he has been working there for 18 years and this is the first time ever he’s had to cancel this tournament. Bryant says along with the dents, they have to remove the broken tree limbs from around the course. Bryant hopes the course will be reopened by the weekend but says it all depends on the weather.
“When you have hundreds of thousands of hail stones hitting the greens, it’s just like a battlefield,” Bryant said. “We have to do different grounds practices to get the greens back into smooth condition. Hopefully, we will be able to open this weekend.”
After winning her first Epson Tour title in 2015, Rohanna bought a heifer to celebrate.
Rachel Rohanna is in the midst of a 10-day road trip on the Epson Tour, one of the longest stints she’s endured away from her husband and two kids. It helped that the day before she left, Rohanna qualified for her fourth U.S. Women’s Open with husband Ethan Virgili on the bag.
With this year’s championship at Lancaster Country Club May 30-June 2, it will be an especially meaningful Women’s Open for the Pennsylvania native. She rented a four-bedroom house for the week, but given the number of family members who plan to make the trip, might need to secure more space.
“This will definitely be a once-in-a-lifetime thing for us,” said Rohanna of playing so close to their Waynesburg home.
Rohanna, 33, medaled at the Shannopin Country Club qualifying site in Pittsburgh with rounds of 69-71, and then boarded an early-morning flight to Phoenix the next day for the Epson Tour stop in Scottsdale. It will be a FaceTime Mother’s Day for Rohanna as she connects with 5-year-old Gemelia and seven-month-old Greenlee from across the country. She’d hoped the family would travel with her out west, but Gemelia couldn’t miss the run-up to her kindergarten graduation.
Rachel Rohanna and family celebrate her medal-winning performance at U.S. Women’s Open qualifying. (courtesy photo)
Rohanna will take the redeye out of Utah after the Copper Rock Championship to make it back for doctors’ appointments, graduation and prep work for Gemelia’s sixth birthday party, featuring a Barbie theme with plenty of pink.
“Every time I turn around, she’s inviting more friends,” said Rohanna, with a laugh. The big event will kick off Sunday of U.S. Women’s Open week.
Juggling tour life, mom life and ranch life is an all-hands-on-deck experience. Rohanna and husband Ethan Virgili own ERV Cattle Co., and they recently had a big sale in Hershey. After winning her first Epson Tour title in 2015, Rohanna bought a heifer to celebrate.
Rohanna was 11 weeks pregnant when she stayed with two-time major winner Brittany Lincicome at a tournament last year and asked what it was like traveling the tour with two young children. The message: You don’t know until you just jump in and do it.
“If you travel with two,” said LPGA veteran and broadcaster Karen Stupples, “it’s not just double the work, it’s exponentially increased.”
Stupples has one son, 17-year-old Logan, whom she raised on tour, but she also had a front-row seat to Catriona Matthew’s time traveling with her two girls.
“People were tricking me when they said, ‘Oh going from one to two is not that hard,’ ” said Rohanna, laughing.
The first time Rohanna took both girls on the road with her was for offseason practice in Florida just after Thanksgiving when Greenlee was two months old. The next time came in March for the Epson Tour opener in Winter Haven, Florida. Rohanna was up three times a night with Greenlee.
“I was like there’s no way I can do this,” she recalled. “I’m up with her three times a night during the tournament and not getting any sleep. The chaos of the week – it showed with my scores.”
They’ve gotten into a better rhythm of late, and family support remains crucial.
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Rohanna won the 2017 Symetra Tour Championship when she was six weeks pregnant with Gemelia and is believed to be the first mom to earn LPGA status through the developmental tour when she graduated in 2021. While Rohanna does have LPGA status from maternity leave, she has yet to make a start on that tour this season.
Traveling with kids in tow is always an adventure, especially on the Espon Tour where there is no daycare. Five years ago, during the final round of the Copper Rock Championship, Rohanna reached into her bag to pull out a club and discovered that Gemelia’s 23-inch kid’s club had slipped to the bottom.
She called over a rules official and received a four-stroke penalty for having a U.S. Kids 7-iron as her 15th club.
The penalty cost her $900 in earnings, critical on a tour that awards LPGA cards based on the money list. The first time Rohanna graduated from the Epson Tour in 2015, she squeaked in the final card by $284.
Rohanna didn’t qualify for Women’s Open the last time it was held at Lancaster, but she was an alternate for the 2010 championship at Oakmont. She was amazed by the support she felt from the community back then even when she wasn’t even in the field.
No doubt it will be strong this time around in a state where Rohanna’s maternal grandmother, Roseann Schwartz, was a golf course owner and head coach at Youngstown State, and her grandfather, Dick Schwartz, played on the PGA Tour and senior circuit.
In the meantime, Mother’s Day will be special for Rohanna, even if she’s a long way from their Pennsylvania home and reliant on technology to bring them together.
Greenlee, who was born with severe hearing loss in her left ear, was fitted for life-changing hearing aids in January. She’s in the process of learning signs now, and lights up when Rohanna brings her hand to her face to sign “mom.”
Gemelia, who likes to write books for mom while she’s gone, will no doubt have a special one ready when Rohanna returns from this long trip.
Wilson wrote in a touching Instagram post for the man many called “Goose.”
Yana Wilson will never forget the 2024 Epson Tour season opener. It started out as a reunion of sorts as Wilson met up again with Rick Evans, the longtime Liberty National caddie who was on her bag for the win at the AJGA Mizuho Americas Open last summer. Wilson, 17, won the junior event right alongside Rose Zhang.
Evans collapsed on Tuesday during a practice round at the Florida’s Natural Charity Classic in Winter Haven, Florida. On Thursday evening, the night before the start of the 54-hole event, Wilson’s family learned that the caddie known as “Goose” had died.
Wilson, who was playing in the event as an amateur, wrote in a touching Instagram post that she would do her best to make him proud. She stayed in the tournament, recording three eagles in Saturday’s round to sit only two strokes back of the leaders.
But Wilson fell ill on Sunday, and as she tried to warm up for the final round, she was too dizzy to compete and withdrew from the tournament.
“I have never met a caddie better than you,” Wilson wrote. “Your ability to guide and encourage was unmatched.”
Wilson had set a goal of winning a professional title before she graduated from high school. Such lofty goals are often placed on her annual vision boards. The first year she won the Drive, Chip and Putt National Finals at Augusta National, for example, Wilson had the Masters leaderboard on her board.
Two years ago when she won the U.S. Girls’ Junior, she’d posted a picture of Minjee Lee hoisting the Girls’ Junior trophy.
Like many junior players, Wilson tries to emulate 2023 Augusta National Womens Amateur champ Zhang as much as she can. For example, her mindset coming into this week’s Epson Tour event was quite different compared to her first sponsor exemption on the developmental tour.
“I thought I’d kind of have it in the bag back then,” said Wilson, “which obviously isn’t the best mindset to walk into a tournament with.
“This time I have no expectation. … That’s also kind of what Rose talks about all the time – having no expectations.”
Yana Wilson and Rose Zhang imitate a “selfie” with their trophies after the final round of the 2023 Mizuho Americas Open at Liberty National Golf Club in Jersey City, New Jersey. (Photo: Elsa/Getty Images)
Last summer, Wilson played in her first LPGA major at the U.S. Women’s Open at Pebble Beach. She recently received an invitation to compete in the Amundi Evian Championship this July.
Her favorite pro, Minjee Lee, won that one as well.
Wilson, who was born and raised in Henderson, Nevada, went out to watch her favorite LPGA players as a youngster at the Kia Classic near San Diego. She was 8 years old the first time Lee caught her eye and gave her a golf ball.
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While winning the Girls’ Junior is the most obvious comparison between the two, there’s one more similarity that’s nothing short of shocking.
Wilson was out watching the LPGA at Aviara in 2016. She’d stepped back from Lee to watch Lydia Ko when she heard a tremendous roar coming from the 16th. Lee had holed out for an ace on the drivable par 4.
Two years later, Wilson did the same from 290 yards on the downhill dogleg as they chased a setting sun.
“It was such a crazy coincidence,” she said of her first ace.
Wilson, who was taught by her father, Jim, would like nothing more than to add something to her resume this spring that Lee doesn’t boast: a stroke-play victory at Augusta National.
