You can forgive Sarah Ingram if she feels like she’s experiencing some déjà vu in the coming weeks. In December 2019, the U.S. Curtis Cup captain hosted a group of top female American amateurs for a practice session in preparation for the scheduled June 2020 matches versus Great Britain & Ireland in Wales. But, like many golf events last year, COVID-19 forced the postponement of the biennial competition to Aug. 26-28, 2021 at Conwy Golf Club.
With that, Ingram and the USGA will again gather some of the leading American contenders for a two-day session, Jan. 29-30 at Lake Nona Golf & Country Club in Orlando. The 12 players who attendance the USGA confirmed Monday are (current college affiliation in parenthesis):
*Allisen Corpuz, 22, Honolulu, Hawaii (USC)
*Lauren Hartlage, 22, Elizabethtown, Ky. (Louisville)
*Auston Kim, 20, St. Augustine, Fla. (Vanderbilt)
*Gina Kim, 20, Durham, N.C. (Duke)
Rachel Kuehn, 19, Asheville, N.C. (Wake Forest)
Brooke Matthews, 22, Rogers, Ark. (Arkansas)
*Emilia Migliaccio, 21, Cary, N.C. (Wake Forest)
*Kaitlyn Papp, 22, Austin, Texas (Texas)
Megan Schofill, 19, Monticello, Fla. (Auburn)
*Aneka Seumanutafa, 20, Emmitsburg, Md. (Ohio State)
Kennedy Swann, 22, Austin, Texas (Mississippi)
*Rose Zhang, 17, Irvine, Calif.
* attended the previous USGA practice session
“It was incredibly disappointing to postpone [the 2020] match, so to get back together as a group and restart the team selection process is exciting,” said Ingram, a three-time Curtis Cup player (1992, 1994, 1996). “The level of talent in women’s amateur golf in this country right now is really impressive, and these players are all very accomplished, both inside and outside the game. I look forward to having the chance to get to know these young women better.”
None of the 12 players have competed previously in the Curtis Cup, but all have extensive amateur experience. Zhang, who has committed to play college golf at Stanford, is the won the 2020 U.S. Women’s Amateur title and the 2020 McCormack Medal for the top amateur of the season. Papp, a Texas junior, recently played in the U.S. Women’s Open, where she earned low amateur honors when she finished T-9 at Champions Golf Club in Houston.
Players who aren’t at the practice session are still eligible to make Ingram’s eight-player roster. Five of the spots are reserved for automatic selections as the reigning U.S. Women’s Amateur champion and McCormack Medal winners are automatic picks for the team if they’re Americans. The 2021 Women’s Amateur is scheduled for Aug. 2-8 at Westchester Country Club in Rye, N.Y., and the McCormack Medal winner will be named shortly after.
Also, the top three Americans on the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking at a still to be determined date.
The U.S. team, which leads the overall series 29-8-3, is coming off a lopsided 17-3 victory over the GB&I in 2018 at Quaker Ridge Golf Club outside New York City. But the Americans have not won the match as the away side since 2008 at the Old Course at St. Andrews.