Top seeds Caffrey, Blinn, Hendrick
survive scares
01:00 AM EDT on Thursday, July 14, 2005
NEWPORT -- There were no upsets in the
quarterfinal round of the five-day Ocean State Women's Golf State Amateur Championships
yesterday at Newport National, but all the underdogs gave the favorites a run
for their money.
Top-seeded Ally Caffrey
(Wannamoissett), the Colonial Athletic Association Rookie of the Year, edged
eighth-seeded Carol Clarey (Segregansett), 2 and 1, and Crestwood's Valerie
Blinn, the defending OSWGA champion and No. 2 seed, overcame a three-stroke
deficit to beat seventh-seeded Marisa White (Triggs), 3 and 2.
Jennifer Hendrick (Exeter),
seeded third, survived Crestwood's Kay Bullock, 3 and 2.Fourth-seeded Kibbe
Reilly (Agawam Hunt), trailing most of the round, came on late to defeat upset
specialist Roberta Hunt (Wannamoissett), the 12th seed, 1-up.
The close battles are what
it's all about, Blinn said.
"Everybody is always
supporting everyone else and we always cheer one another on because we want to
see everybody do well," Blinn said. "I'm out here to compete and
advance and play well, but I want everyone else to play well, too, to make it
competitive."
"Close matches make it a
lot more fun," Hendrick said.
Caffrey received a stiff test
from Clarey. On the front nine, Clarey won holes two, five, and seven, but
Caffrey won holes 1, 3, 4, 6 and 8 to take a two-stroke lead at the turn.
"If I didn't have that
cushioning that I had on the front nine, I probably wouldn't have won,"
Caffrey said.
That's because Caffrey ran
into a bit of trouble on the par-4 10th, where she said she lost her
concentration after being distracted by groundskeepers.
"From then on I didn't
feel comfortable," Caffrey said. "I was getting it close enough but I
just couldn't make the putts. I wasn't finishing. You kind of lose your touch
with poor putting and [Clarey] kept firing them in."
The two halved the 10th, but
Clarey won the 11th to cut Caffrey's lead to one stroke. The 19-year-old phenom
rebounded on the 12th, winning the hole with a short putt. Though Clarey won
the 13th, Caffrey did not let her win another hole.
"I just grinded it
out," Caffrey said.
Hunt actually shot a lower
round than Reilly, 77-76, but Reilly won the holes when she needed.
After winning the par-4 second
hole, Reilly watched Hunt go 2-up when she won holes 4, 5 and 6. Though Reilly
answered when she rolled in a short putt for par to win the par-4 seventh, Hunt
won the eighth to go back up by two by the turn.
Trailing by three strokes
after Hunt sank a short birdie putt on the par-4 10th, Reilly made her move on
the 11th, where she two-putted for par to win the hole.
"I did a really bad job
on the 10th hole and I got pretty upset about that so I just started focusing
like I needed to," Reilly said.
She won holes 12, 14, 16. Tied
heading into the 18th hole, Reilly two-putted for par to win the hole and the
match.
Hendrick, trailing by two
strokes after the first five holes, evened the score by the turn and won holes
10, 11, and 13 en route to her victory over Bullock. Blinn, trailing by
three-strokes after four holes, gathered herself and shot 2-under on holes 5
through 14 to take a three-stroke lead that carried her to victory.
Caffrey will play Reilly, and
Blinn will be challenged by Hendrick in today's semifinal round.