The 19th-ranked player in the world represented the United States on four occasions at the Solheim Cup (2019, 2021, 2023 and 2024), compiling a 3-12-1 record.
Here’s a look at the former Mississippi State Bulldog through the years.
Ally Ewing is ready for the next chapter. The 31-year-old American, a three-time winner on the LPGA, made her retirement announcement on Instagram Wednesday morning ahead of the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship.
She’s currently ranked 18th in the world.
“It is with a heavy but grateful heart, that I want to announce that I’ll be retiring from professional golf at the end of this year,” Ewing said in a poignant video. “When I envisioned my career, I never dreamed this small-town Mississippi girl could have had the career that God has blessed me with.”
Ewing was born in Fulton, Mississippi, a don’t-blink town of about 4,500 that, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, is about 8.7 square miles. She honed her golf skills at Fulton Country Club, a hilly nine-hole course that tips out at 5,700 yards after two loops.
There’s no range at Fulton, so Ewing and childhood friend Chad Ramey, now a PGA Tour player, designed their own makeshift range across fairways. They aimed at trees and shagged their own balls, trying to stay out of the way of paying customers.
A self-described tomboy, Ewing begged her mom Angie to play on the middle school football team as quarterback, but mom said they were drawing the line.
While the highly-competitive Ewing shined as a point guard on the girls’ team at Itawamba Agricultural High School, she made her name playing golf with the boys. Ewing, formerly McDonald, became the first girl to win the Mississippi boys state high school championship. The coolest thing about winning, she once said, was that she did it from 7,000 yards, the longest course she’d ever played.
In college, Ewing put Mississippi State on the map, winning five times before joining the now Epson Tour in 2016, where she earned her full LPGA card for the following season.
Ewing won her first LPGA title on her 28th birthday in 2020, several months after she married Charlie Ewing, head women’s golf coach at her alma mater.
Now in her eighth full season on the LPGA, Ewing has $6 million in career earnings and 25 career top-10 finishes. This season alone she’s made $1.8 million on the strength of three top-10 finishes at the majors. She’s ranked ninth of the CME points list, which means she’ll wrap up her career in November at the CME Group Tour Championship, which boasts a $4 million winner’s prize.
“I’ve seen so much of the world and met so many incredible people,” Ewing said in her video, “but I’ve also never felt more alone at times and have missed out on things that were so close to my heart.
“I’ve cried many tears, but I will never take for granted what this game has done for me. I have fulfilled a dream that many strive for.”
Ewing said the highest honor of her career was representing the U.S. at the Solheim Cup, which she did on four separate occasions, finally getting a taste of victory earlier this month in Virginia.
Several of Ewing’s Solheim Cup teammates commented on her Instagram post, including Lexi Thompson, who announced earlier in the year her decision to retire from full-time competition at the end of this season. Jennifer Kupcho noted that the tour will miss Ewing’s “bright light.”
“While I’ve always felt I was able to balance golf and life,” said Ewing, “every decision I’ve made since I was young has always been deliberated with how it would impact golf.”
On the first day of the competition, fans waited for upwards of 90 minutes for what should have been a short shuttle ride from the parking lots. Could the Presidents Cup be in store for a similar fate?
Presidents Cup tournament director Ryan Hart has been prepping for this week for three years and he says the parking and transportation plan has been vetted and they are ready to go.
“I felt for them,” he said of the Solheim Cup debacle. “It makes you look at your own systems and do a gut check to make sure you’re as buttoned up as you can be.”
Hart and his team will have their work cut out for them. The match between the U.S. men’s 12 best and the International Team, which is made up of the 12 best from the rest of the world excluding Europe, is being held at Royal Montreal Golf Club in Ile-Bizard, Quebec, one of the three populated islands within the city of Montreal. The Jacques-Bizard Bridge connects it across the Riviere des Prairies with Sainte-Genevieve on the Island of Montreal.
The bridge is the only way on and off the island and with more than 30,000 spectators expected to the attend the competition daily, what could possibly go wrong?
“Priority No. 1 when I got this job was to make sure that we had a plan to get our people from downtown and surrounding hotels to the property as efficiently as possible,” Hart said.
But despite all that lead time, the plan to expand the bridge from three to four lanes, which is expected to ease the commute for Ile-Bizard residents, remains under construction. While Presidents Cup officials were assured the project would be completed ahead of the biennial competition, which begins Thursday, Sept. 26, that is not the case. The construction project has been delayed and won’t be completed till at least the first quarter of 2025. Hart said that hurdle has been addressed as best as possible.
“We do this for a living and started tweaking our plan when we were given notice in the first quarter of this year,” Hart said.
Royal Montreal previously hosted the Presidents Cup in 2007 and the RBC Canadian Open in 2014, so the PGA Tour, which operates the biennial competition flipping between U.S. and international sites, has dealt with this bridge issue before.
“Let me tell you, 15 years ago it was horrible,” said one local resident in an interview with CBC. “This time it’s going to be worse with the bridge.”
“I’m already planning to just stay at home as much as I can and try to work from home that week,” another local commuter said.
And the CBC’s best local resident response: “I hope they helicopter them in.”
Hart noted that an F1 race held on the island in June highlighted some potential “pinch points” and elevated their focus to those areas. Workers have been building the site for the event since last October and have a game plan to address traffic concerns for what Hart called the Tour’s biggest global event. (It has a floorplan three times the size of that at the RBC Canadian Open, the Tour’s largest tournament north of the border.)
The tournament built a bus and shuttle drop-off terminal to manage traffic going over the bridge from a 40-minute radius and disperse people to multiple pickup points for shuttle service. There are four points where people can park and shuttle to the tournament, offering both free and paid options. There are also two other pickup spots without parking near metro stops where spectators can hop a free ride (roughly 25 minutes) to the tournament’s main entrance. All lots will have shuttles running on a 20-minute loop.
The first tee shot on Thursday isn’t until 11:35 a.m. ET (gates open at 9 a.m. ET) and shuttle service begins at 7 a.m., so there should be ample time to be there for balls in the air. There’s also a rideshare lot and new taxi-shuttle-HOV lanes – a fast-pass lane – have been added to the route from downtown Montreal since the competition was last held there, and should alleviate congestion.
Due to the bridge delay, tournament organizers did reduce the on-site parking footprint, which is limited to those big spenders who bought hospitality, as well as staffing, according to Hart. Only those local residents with a hangtag pass will be permitted to cross the bridge from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily.
But for the 18,000 people who live on the island, Ile-Bizard Mayor Doug Hurley said he expects the traffic congestion to be a headache.
“You’re basically going to suffer,” said Ile-Bizard Mayor Doug Hurley.
Maguire called sitting out of an entire day of Solheim Cup matches a “bitter pill to swallow.”
Leona Maguire called sitting out of an entire day of Solheim Cup matches last Saturday a “bitter pill to swallow.” The gritty Irishwoman noted that European captain Suzann Pettersen didn’t give her much reason, but that the feeling she got was that leadership felt her game was too short and she didn’t make enough birdies for the setup at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club.
In Sunday singles, when everyone plays, the player nicknamed “MVP” by her peers, put up five birdies in 15 holes to win 4 up over Ally Ewing. Maguire said she felt like she proved there’s “more than one way to skin a cat.”
Fast forward to this week’s Kroger Queen City Championship, where the former Duke star opened with a 67 at TPC River’s Bend.
She was asked after that round if the 67 was a message to Pettersen.
“No, I mean, me and Suzann are on very good terms,” Maguire told Golf Channel. “I have a lot of respect for her. She was a hero of mine growing up. Ultimately, it was her decision last week. She did what was best for the team.
“I would’ve been happy to sit out every match if it meant we brought back the trophy. I knew my game was in good shape. Showed that in the singles last week, and just trying to finish off the season as strong as I can.”
In her first two Solheim Cup appearances, Maguire played in all five matches and was the heart of the lineup. She played only twice in Virginia, where Team USA won the Solheim for the first time since 2017.
Maguire, who ultimately tied for 45th at the Kroger, said it had been a rough couple of months leading into the Solheim and that she hasn’t enjoyed her golf as much as she would’ve liked. The Solheim served as a reminder of how fun the game can be, even if her role turned out much differently than anyone expected.
After Europe lost the cup, Pettersen was asked about her decision to sit Maguire for so many sessions. The fiery Norwegian said she doesn’t live her life with regrets.
“You’d rather play with your gut feel and your heart,” she said. “Sometimes you get outplayed.”
If there is an audience hungry for team golf, then LIV would have drawn greater numbers.
It’s a sobering measure of how uncompetitive the Presidents Cup has been that Mark O’Meara — who retired from the game this weekend at the mummified age of 67 — was the second-ranked golfer in the world when the United States suffered its last (and only) defeat in 1998. The last (and only) time that the Internationals managed a tie was in 2003, when the top 20 in the world rankings featured just two men not now on the senior tour: Tiger Woods and Freddie Jacobson, and Freddie receives his AARP card on Thursday, the day on which the 16th Presidents Cup gets underway in Montreal.
There’s a passionate audience for team golf that thrills fans and stress tests competitors. Just not all team golf delivers that. The Ryder and Solheim Cups do, but for multiple reasons, the Presidents Cup has struggled for traction. It’s not the dearth of history — the Solheim Cup is only four years older — but rather an amorphous team identity and a lack of competitiveness.
It’s tough to rally around the Internationals without suggesting an anti-U.S. vibe, a delicate balance made no easier by this year’s “away” match happening less than 30 miles from the New York border. (As the ProV1 flies, Royal Montreal is closer to U.S. captain Jim Furyk’s birthplace in Pennsylvania than to his Canadian counterpart Mike Weir’s hometown in Ontario). And for compelling competition, there must be the possibility that Goliath could lose, and the last time that happened R. Kelly was No. 1 in the Billboard charts and not inmate No. 09627-035 at a Federal Correctional Institution in North Carolina.
Which isn’t to say there’s no effort and pride around the Presidents Cup. Generations of International skippers have had plenty, and Furyk recently took umbrage when my colleague, Adam Schupak, suggested a U.S. loss would be better for the event’s relevance. “Go f—k yourself,” the American leader said in a delightfully unparliamentary rebuke. But Cap’n Jim might be the only resident of Ponte Vedra Beach so strongly opposed to the benefits of defeat.
Jim Furyk of the U.S. Team at the 2017 Presidents Cup at Liberty National Golf Club. (Rob Carr/Getty Images)
Next week will go a long way toward determining the future of the Presidents Cup. It’s profitable — the amount varies widely by location — but with every aspect of the PGA Tour’s business under scrutiny by private equity investors, another easy U.S. victory might force a rethink on how to better maximize product value. There are regular calls for the Presidents Cup to become a co-ed event, but it’s hardly outlandish to wonder if it will be repackaged as a bridge between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf, should the Department of Justice insist the Saudi circuit not be binned as part of a deal between the Tour and the Public Investment Fund.
It seems likely that team golf will be a component in any definitive agreement with the PIF, whose governor, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, is apparently convinced that such franchises will become highly valuable. Even if he’s correct — a generous grant — realizing value is years off. Short term, it remains a tough sell, and not just because LIV’s laughably execrable product has poisoned the well when it comes to fan perceptions of team golf not organized around national loyalty.
Any future team platform operated by PGA Tour Enterprises will probably be seeded from TGL, the simulator-based league backed by Woods and Rory McIlroy, even if it involves LIV teams competing too. But like every concept mooted in golf these days, that raises questions with no readily apparent answers. Will consumers who enjoy a biennial U.S.-Europe feast take to being force-fed team events more frequently? Will they embrace simulator golf as tightly packaged entertainment on Tuesday nights in winter? What about on nights when Woods and McIlroy aren’t playing? Will they care enough to invest themselves in team standings week to week?
And, trickiest of all, what will they sacrifice from their normal diet to accommodate team golf?
If team franchises are to gain value, they need a season that extends beyond a few winter weeks indoors in Florida. There has to be a green grass element too. And that’s where team golf collides with the brick wall impacting every aspect of the PGA Tour-PIF negotiations: the schedule.
Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland interacts with Matteo Manassero of Italy after they both scored an eagle on the fourth hole during day three of the BMW PGA Championship 2024 at Wentworth Club on September 21, 2024, in Virginia Water, England. (Photo by Andrew Redington/Getty Images)
Top golfers won’t work more than 24-26 weeks a year. Earlier this month, McIlroy said he wants to play just 18-20 weeks. For non-LIV guys, that doesn’t leave much time after accounting for majors, the Players Championship, a Ryder Cup, the FedEx Cup playoffs, the signature Tour events and whatever sundry stops guys feel obliged to make on home circuits. The only way team golf doesn’t come at the expense of something else on the calendar is if it’s bolted on to existing tournaments — for example, Tuesday afternoon matches at the Memorial or the Travelers Championship. Even that solution demands those sponsors be willing to share their week and leaves open the question of scheduling playoffs or a team grand finale.
All of these unknowns exist against a backdrop of fan apathy. If there is an audience hungry for team golf, then LIV would have drawn greater numbers, even allowing for the garish theatrics and players who’d struggle to win a popularity contest if it was staged at Smith College and the only other candidate was J.D. Vance.
The best scenario we can hope for is a team product emerging that engages fans and taps into the passion we see around Ryder and Solheim Cups. The second best scenario is that if team golf fails, it should fail quickly. Because at this juncture, it seems more like an off-ramp being built to save Al-Rumayyan’s blushes and less like the gleaming new highway he imagines it to be.
The 2026 Solheim Cup will take place Sept. 11-13 at Bernardus Golf in the Netherlands.
With both Suzann Pettersen and Stacy Lewis serving as captains for back-to-back Solheim Cups in 2023 and 2024, it wouldn’t be surprising to see new faces at the helm for both teams in 2026.
On the European side, no captain has had more than two stints since Mickey Walker headed the first four Solheims. On the U.S. side, Juli Inkster became the first to serve three terms from 2015-19.
The 2026 Solheim Cup will take place Sept. 11-13 at Bernardus Golf in the Netherlands.
So, who’s in line to lead?
Madelene Sagstrom and Anna Nordqvist of Team Europe on the first green during the Friday Fourball matches against Team United States during the first round of the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club on September 13, 2024 in Gainesville, Virginia. (Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
Well, there’s a general feeling the job is too big now for someone to step in without having first served as an assistant captain, so that narrows down the list of possibilities.
Should Anna Nordqvist be ready to relinquish her playing duties, she’d be the obvious next choice. Nordqvist, a three-time major winner who has played on nine Solheim Cup teams, served as a playing vice captain for Pettersen the past two cups. The 37-year-old Swede was a captain’s pick in 2024.
Mel Reid, a vice captain in 2024, is another possibility. The 36-year-old Englishwoman has talked about slowing down her schedule in recent years and worked some for Golf Channel in 2024.
Assistant Captain for Team Europe Mel Reid talks with Team Europe on the 15th green during the first round of the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club on September 13, 2024 in Gainesville, Virginia. (Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
Karen Stupples, a major winner and longtime Golf Channel analyst and on-course reporter, should be on the short-list to be an assistant captain in 2026. The 51-year-old recently served as an assistant captain to Catriona Matthew at the recent Curtis Cup at Sunningdale, where Great Britain and Ireland beat the U.S. in a thrilling contest.
Laura Davies has been a vice captain at the last four cups but still has no interest in the top job, though she has said in the past she would if the cup was ever held in England. (Amazingly, the Solheim has never been staged in England.)
While the list of obvious candidates seems to be relatively short at the moment on the European side, the U.S. is rich with options.
Assistant Captain of the United States team Angela Stanford prior to the Solheim Cup at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club on September 12, 2024 in Gainesville, Virginia. (Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
Angela Stanford, a three-time assistant captain, seems the most obvious choice for 2026. The 46-year-old major winner, who is set to retire at the end of this season, represented the U.S. in six Solheims. Stanford has also worked for Golf Channel as an on-course reporter and, should she return to that role in 2026, will be still well-involved with the tour.
Paula Creamer, Morgan Pressel and Brittany Lincicome also served as assistant captains for Lewis in 2024. All three major winners have extensive Solheim Cup resumes. Michelle Wie West, now pregnant with her second child, served as an assistant captain in 2021 and is a slam dunk to hold the post sometime down the road.
Lewis called on the next captain to make sure Lexi Thompson comes on as an assistant for 2026. Thompson announced earlier this year she was stepping away from full-time competition after this season.
“Lexi needs to be there in the team room,” said Lewis. “She needs to be around these girls. She’s just great energy to have around.”
Sunday was a sigh of relief for the Americans. For the first time in seven years, the U.S. team knocked off the Europeans to win the 2024 Solheim Cup.
There were numerous standouts for the United States at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, including Megan Khang and Virginia native Lauren Coughlin, but none moreso than Rose Zhang, the 21-year-old phenom who went 4-0-0, including a dominating 6-and-4 victory in singles against Carlota Ciganda.
Zhang’s second Solheim Cup appearance went a lot better than her first last year in Spain, where she admitted she struggled to get comfortable while going 0-2-1 at Finca Cortesin.
On home soil, she had a historic week.
Zhang is the eighth different player and third different American in Solheim Cup history to finish 4-0-0 or better. The other two Americans to go 4-0-0 are Dottie Pepper (1998) and Morgan Pressel (2011). She is also the first player ever to go 4-0-0 or better and never reach the 17th hole in any match. This week, Zhang led all players by winning 28 holes and only losing eight; that 20+ win/loss hole differential is the most dominant in the last 20 years.
The next best performance over that time is Jessica Korda in 2019, winning 29 holes and losing 14 holes
“It’s been absolutely incredible,” Zhang said of her week. “I feel like starting off the beginning of the week, I just felt so comfortable with everyone. The whole team has just been — they’ve just been so friendly, and everyone has had a good time in the team room, on the golf course. Like Stacy (Lewis) said, it translated over to the golf course.
“I felt a lot more loose than I did last year, and it was good vibes all around.”
Rose Zhang of Team USA reacts after her putt on the second green during single matches against Team Europe during the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-Imagn Images
Khang (3-0-0), Coughlin (3-0-1) and Andrea Lee (2-0-1) were the other Americans to go undefeated. It is the second time the U.S. team had that many undefeated players at one Solheim Cup.
Zhang’s dominance was no surprise to U.S. Captain Stacy Lewis, who along with stats guru Justin Ray put together a plan with plenty of data to lead the Americans to victory.
“The golf course was made for you, Rose,” Lewis told her star after winning Sunday.
GAINESVILLE, Va. — One of the biggest concerns Team USA captains had coming into the 19th Solheim Cup was the 40-minute bus ride they had each day to and from Robert Trent Jones Golf Club. Team vibes can’t be found in the dirt or the data.
When they got on the bus that first day, there weren’t any speakers, noted assistant captain Angela Stanford. That’s when Nelly Korda came to the rescue. The World No. 1 found a speaker and helped turn the bus rides into an epic experience. For the past two nights, players and caddies entered the hotel jamming to Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance with Somebody.” People in the bar cheered.
“She set the tone for the week,” said Stanford of Korda’s demeanor. “I think when one of your best players is relaxed, it lightens everyone up.”
No one really wanted to talk about pressure entering this week, but the U.S. had never lost four cups in a row. Had the outcome at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club gone differently, the cries of “What’s wrong with Team USA?” would’ve been rung loudly for the next two years.
For a long time, it looked like Lexi Thompson might end her Solheim Cup career by clinching the cup. Such storybook endings are popular at the biennial event. Alas, it wasn’t to be for the player who spent more than a decade as the face of American golf.
Lexi Thompson of Team USA lines up a putt on the second green during single matches against Team Europe during the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-Imagn Images
That honor went to World No. 2 Lilia Vu, who had 103 yards downwind for her approach shot into the 18th, her least favorite number to hit. Down 1 hole going into the 18th against European rookie Albane Valenzuela, Vu looked at the leaderboard and knew she had to deliver. She stuffed it to 18 inches to tie the match and secure the last half point.
“It’s a lot of pressure, but that’s what you work hard for all your life,” said Vu. “This is the moment. That was my moment.”
The final tally of 15½-12½ belies how close it felt out there. Europe actually won the singles session.
“At 2:25 we were still out there having a chance at this remarkable,” said European captain Suzann Pettersen, “and I don’t think the Americans anticipated such a fight from us.”
Lauren Coughlin, the 31-year-old Virginian who waited longer than anyone for this chance, went 3-0-1 for the week, mounting a tremendous comeback on Sunday against Maja Stark to secure a late half point. Lewis took a diverse group of phenoms and late-bloomers who are largely introverted and gave them a simple message: “You be you.”
No one looks more comfortable on a Solheim Cup stage than Megan Khang, the hype player with substance. For a second consecutive cup, Khang went undefeated with a 3-0-0 record, her voice hoarse from all the cheering.
Rose Zhang said the week reignited her passion for golf. She became the eighth player, and third American, in Solheim Cup history to finish 4-0-0. She’s also the first player to never reach the 17th hole in any match.
“I felt a lot more loose than I did last year,” said Zhang, “and it was good vibes all around.”
The fun transferred from the bus and the team room to the course, with players showing a side of themselves that most, including Lewis, had never seen.
Team Captain for Team United States Stacy Lewis reacts with her team after winning the Solheim Cup during the Sunday Singles matches during the final round of the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club on September 15, 2024 in Gainesville, Virginia. (Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
“I know their personalities and I’m around them off the golf course, but to do that in front of everybody and to feel comfortable doing that,” said Lewis, “I knew we were doing a lot of things right behind the scenes.”
Buses, it turns out, were a theme of the week. While the Americans were rockin’ out on their bus, thousands of fans waited two to three hours to simply board one. The first tee on Friday morning was a shell of itself as a transportation failure of monumental proportions spoiled a day of celebration in the women’s game.
Mercifully, the tour managed to get it sorted for the weekend and the focus shifted back to golf, where Lewis put into practice the road map she and stats guru Justin Ray put together heading into the week.
Lewis’ motto for the week was “Unfinished Business” after last year’s heartbreaking tie in Spain, which sent the cup back to Europe. Ray’s theme was “run the football.”
“We are a run the football, ground and pound team,” said Ray. “We were going to hit it to 15 feet over and over and over again.
“We knew all along on this golf course that the strength of our team is going to be mid- to long-range approaches. We didn’t want to put a bunch of wedges in the European’s hands. If we had 6-, 7-, 8-irons in our hands, that’s what’s going to be our advantage.”
Nelly Korda of Team USA plays her shot from the third tee during single matches against Team Europe during the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-Imagn Images
On Sunday, Korda skipped out of the tunnel in front of an electric crowd to face Charley Hull in a marquee opener. That match was the only thing that didn’t go Korda’s way this week. Hull smoked her, 6 and 4, but it did little to dampen the overall week for a player who’d won six times in the first half of the season, including her second major.
“This was probably the most fun I’ve had on a golf course – ever,” said Korda. “Just the team, the team environment, the caddies, everyone getting along, the fans. Everyone was so incredible. We all vibed really well off of each other. This is probably the most I’ve laughed and the most I’ve fist-pumped ever on a golf course. It was just an amazing week and a dream come true.”
Beth Daniel, one of 10 past U.S. captains on the ground in Virginia, said Lewis has forever changed the Solheim Cup over the past three years. She brought in KPMG to fund an analytics program that completely shifted the way pairings were picked.
The data enabled Lewis to explain her strategy to players – why she wanted to play them where and with whom.
“In the past, some players were like, ‘I’m not playing, but nobody is telling me why,’ ” said Stanford. “She makes you buy in.”
But it’s not just the data. Lewis wanted to build up the appreciation players had for the history of the cup. For example, every American who has ever played the Solheim Cup now has a number. All 69. Daniel is No. 1. Lewis wanted them all to know their place in what’s become the crown jewel of the LPGA, and mostly importantly, she wanted them to love it.
Her holistic approach to the job of captaincy included looking at everything from how much money was budgeted to each area to how many inside-the-ropes passes former captains received (two, for the first time!). Former captains even had their own locker room, and it was deeply appreciated.
Captain for Team United States Stacy Lewis reacts with Assistant captains Paula Creamer and Brittany Lincicome after Team United States wins the Solheim Cup during the Sunday Singles matches during the final round of the Solheim Cup 2024 at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club on September 15, 2024 in Gainesville, Virginia. (Photo by Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
Rare is the player who’s focused not only on the present, but the past and the future as well. Lewis wanted to lay out a blueprint that not only led to more success for Team USA, but made things easier for whoever comes next.
“She just paid attention to every single detail of the Solheim Cup,” said Daniel, “and took it all seriously.”
As the team gathered to take photos with the trophy on the 18th green, Lewis’s husband, Gerrod Chadwell, stood over to the side with their 5-year-old daughter Chesnee. No one knows how much heart and how much sacrifice went into this more than Chadwell, who watched his wife put in many late nights.
“I think she would trade everything that happened in her life up to this point for that,” said an emotional Chadwell, adding “I’ve never wanted something more for somebody in my life.”
On the eve of the final round, Lewis said the joy she saw radiating from her players on the first tee all week meant more to her than the scoreboard.
Zhang, playing in her second cup, finished 4-0-0 to become only the eighth player in Solheim history and third American to finish 4-0-0 or better.
Combined with Lauren Coughlin’s 3-1-0 week and Khang’s 3-0-0 record, it’s the first time three Americans have gone 3-0-0 or better in one Solheim Cup. In 1994, both Dottie Pepper and Brandie Burton finished 3-0-0.
“I just feel like the Solheim Cup reignited my passion for the game,” said Zhang, “and it was so fun to see so many people out here supporting. My teammates have been incredible.”
Lilia Vu was 2 down with two holes to play. The Europeans were making a push. The World No. 2 slammed the door shut.
The American ended their drought in the Solheim Cup thanks to Vu’s late heroics. She birdied the par-4 17th hole to extend her match against Albane Valenzuela, and then she hit a dart on 18 to a couple feet to win both holes, tie the match and earn a half point to give the United States its first win in the Solheim Cup in seven years, coming out on top at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, winning 15½-12½.
“I can’t even put it into words,” Vu said. “I felt like I didn’t do my part this week and I wanted to get something done. I said to my caddie on 16, I felt like I haven’t done anything for this team, and then 16 comes, and I’m in the back bunker.
“I feel like, ‘oh, no, I have to make up-and-down,’ and she’s been making one-putts on almost every single green so I thought she was going to birdie that hole too. She didn’t, and the then I ended up making up-and-down from the bunker and somehow birdied 17 and got it done on 18 to get the half point.”
Andrea Lee and native Virginian Lauren Coughlin also earn important half points Sunday afternoon, while Megan Khang, Rose Zhang and Allisen Corpuz won their matches for the U.S. to bounce back.
“I fight, that’s kind of what I do. I don’t give up on a round ever,” Coughlin said. “As long as I’m still in it, I’m going to keep playing.
“So I kind of just kept pushing and eventually started hitting shots how I normally do and finally started making some putts at the end.”
For Khang, it’s her second straight Solheim Cup going undefeated.
“The atmosphere is just electric,” she said of the week at Robert Trent Jones Golf club. “I’ve thoroughly enjoyed getting the crowd very much involved. My voice can clearly be the victim of that. But I’d do it a million times over.”
The U.S. now leads the all-time series 11-7-1. The next Solheim Cup is scheduled for Sept. 7-13, 2026, at Bernardus in Netherlands.
