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By Sara Buechler
HOT SPRINGS — Day two of the Virginia State Golf Association Senior and Super Senior Women’s Amateur Championships finished Tuesday at The Omni Homestead Resort, and the two medalists, Boodie McGurn and Dot Bolling are still in the running for the championship titles.
In the Senior championship, McGurn won her match against Maxine Bland, of Westfields Golf Club, 6 and 5 and had nothing but nice things to say about her competitor.
“She is delightful and is going to be a force,” McGurn said. “I played decent, and she played really well. I think the difference is experience in match play versus not having experience in match play.”
There isn’t any extra pressure for McGurn, a member at The Country Club of Virginia, going into match play compared to playing against the field. She said that match play is more about staying with the person she is playing against because it’s a new day.
“I love match play,” McGurn said. “There’s always pressure with tournaments, but to me, it’s tons of fun. Most of these people are just wonderful competitors; it’s fun to play with them.”
Defending champion and No. 2 seed Andrea Miller (Keswick GC) won her match against three-time champion Linda DiVall, of Mount Vernon Country Club, 4 and 3. She also talked her competitor up.
“Linda was playing great. She was solid,” Miller said. “I didn’t think Linda would play a perfect round but at the end of the day, she was pretty darn close.”
Both Monday and Tuesday, Miller favored the back nine compared to the front nine. She calls holes 12-14 her power zone because it is when her game picks up and she starts making birdies.
“I waited until I got to 12, and I strung together four birdies,” Miller said. “I feel like I should play the front nine just as well but for whatever reason, 5 and 6 are tough holes for me; I am not particularly fond of those two holes. I have always liked holes 12 through 15 though.”
Miller is also a big fan of match play because she gets in the mindset of not letting herself fail and needing to par or birdie every hole.
“At the end of the day, I just have to play my best round and focus one shot at a time,” Miller said.
The quarterfinals for the Senior championship will be held Wednesday. In the top half of the bracket, McGurn will face Shelley Savage (Army Navy CC) and Joanne Kitusky (The Dominion Club) will meet Shawn McCullough (Mount Vernon CC). The bottom half features Miller squaring off against Cheryl Grigg (CCV) and Katie Cox (Spotswood CC) battling Mary Cabriele (CC of Fairfax).
In the Super Senior championship, Bolling (Hidden Valley CC) had a tight match against Tillie Aguiar, of Lakeside Park Club, but ended up winning 2 up.
“My putter saved me today,” Bolling said. Aguiar chimed in and said Bolling made some fantastic putts.
Going into Wednesday, Bolling said she wants to stay out of the rough which she describes as “green spaghetti,” because it’s stringy and grabs the clubs.
The No. 2 seed Barbara Wetters, of Williamsburg Golf Club, won her match against Rica Rohrbaugh 3 and 2.
“We had a good competitive round all the way,” Wetters said. “Putting is key,” she continued. “The errors we both had were just mental errors, so I thought we were both hitting the ball pretty well.”
Also advancing to the semifinals were Fran Hensley (Gordon Trent GC) who won 6 and 5 and Marie Anderson (Army Navy CC) who won 5 and 4.
Buechler is a P.J. Boatwright intern with the VSGA.