Claire Choi is about to join the Santa Clara golf team and Spencer Dunaway is heading into his final season at Brigham Young. Before they go, both will play in this year’s U.S. Amateur championships.
Qualifiers were Monday at Kapolei Golf Club. Choi, a Punahou graduate who won the last two state high school championships, birdied four of the final seven holes to shoot a 4-under-par 68 and capture medalist honors.
Selin Hyun, from Seoul, and Megan Yang, from San Jose, were a shot back. They also earned a place in the 118th U.S. Women’s Amateur next month at The Golf Club of Tennessee.
Dunaway, the 2015 state high school champ when he was at Kamehameha, shot rounds of 68-72. He got the lone qualifying spot for next month’s 118th U.S. Amateur, at Pebble Beach and Spyglass Hill in California.
Dunaway had just two bogeys his first 32 holes. He bogeyed three of the last four, along with birdie at the 17th. That was enough to beat first alternate Tyler Ota (68-74) and second alternate Aj Teraoka (72-71) — this year’s state high school champ. Jun Ho Won, Matthew Ma and Zackary Kaneshiro finished at 144. Women’s alternates are Jasmine Cabajar (69) and Jinyu Wu (70), from Florida. Pearl City’s Brittany Fan (71) was the only other women’s golfer to break par in a field of 33 that included three from Japan and one from Australia.
Galdiano helps U.S. to Palmer Cup
With Pearl City’s Mariel Galdiano going 2-2, the United States won this year’s Arnold Palmer Cup, at Evian Resort Golf Club in France.
The Americans claimed 18 of 24 points in Sunday’s singles matches to pull to a 38.5-21.5 victory. Galdiano, a Punahou graduate and rising junior at UCLA, birdied the final hole in the final round to win her match against Thailand’s Jaravee Broochant 1-up.
That would be the score for all Galdiano’s matches. She and partner Shintaro Ban, out of UNLV, lost their mixed fourball match Friday, but won in mixed foursomes the following day. Saturday afternoon, Galdiano and Stanford’s Andrea Lee lost in fourball.
This was the first year the Palmer Cup featured men’s and women’s college golfers. The U.S. leads the overall series 12-9-1 after becoming the first side to win as the visiting team since the 2010 Americans.
