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By Chris Lang
HOT SPRINGS — Andrea Miller (The Club at Glenmore) became third player in history to win three straight Virginia State Golf Association Senior Women’s Amateur Championships, besting Kay Tyler (Belle Haven CC) 5 and 3 on Friday at The Omni Homestead Resort’s Old Course.
Miller joins Peggy Woodard and Kay Schiefelbein as three-peat winners, with Woodard last to accomplish the feat from 1996-98. Miller clinched the match with a conceded birdie on the par-5 15th hole.
THE STORY
Miller hinted at it Thursday after her semifinal win over Joan Gardner. The prospect of trying to join an elite club left her a bit nervous. She couldn’t shake the nerves by the time she took honors on the first tee. She blocked her opening drive right into the trees.
In fact, it took Miller four holes to really settle down. During that time, Tyler—a first-time finalist who said afterward that she wasn’t feeling any pressure because she was a prohibitive underdog going into the match—played her game and took advantage of Miller’s shaky start.
Tyler put her approach on No. 1 to 10 feet and two-putted for par. She hit her tee shot on the par-3 2nd to three feet and converted the birdie, then put her approach on the par-5 3rd to four feet and converted that birdie.
Just like that, the underdog was 2-up three holes into the match. Miller told Tyler afterward that the Tyler had put the “fear of God” into her at that point.
“It took a lot to regain my poise,” Miller said.
But nothing calms the nerves like a made birdie putt, and Miller converted a 16-foot one on No. 4 to quickly cut into Tyler’s lead.
“Absolutely huge,” Miller said. “She came out on fire, and I was like, surely she can’t birdie every hole, right? I sat there before I teed off on 4 and said there’s a lot of golf left. … I knew there were a lot of birdies left that I could get, and when I made that putt on 4, I was like, ‘Yep, here it goes, we’re back.’ And it settled me.”
The birdie putt swung the match. Miller won the next four holes after that to turn the early deficit to a 3-up lead after eight holes. Miller capped the run by draining a 50-foot downhill putt on 8.
“I was like, ‘OK, here she comes,’” Tyler said.
Tyler’s lone hole win after that came on No. 12. Miller tried to reach the green in two on the par-5 hole but the shot stumbled over the cart path into waist-high grass, never to be found, a rare mistake that gave Tyler some hope. That hope was dashed, however, when Tyler missed a four-foot par putt to lose the 13th hole.
“I should not have missed that,” Tyler said. “I was a little too soft with my hands today. I’m usually firmer.”
Miller’s run capped a sensational 2022 VSGA season in which she became the first player since Mimi Hoffman in 2014 to win both the Senior Women’s Amateur and Senior Women’s Stroke Play. Miller won the Stroke Play by 14 shots at Mount Vernon in June and faced just one serious challenge at The Homestead, going to the 17th hole in the semifinals to beat Gardner.
In between, she reached match play at the U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur in Alaska, where she lost to past champion Judith Kyrinis. Miller said she learned a little something about herself in that match.
“One of the things that I learned at the U.S. Senior is that pressing too early is not a good thing,” Miller said. “Remaining patient is key. Had I not had that experience at the U.S. Senior, I might have been pressing on 4. But playing with patience and playing your game, especially with so many holes left, is the right approach.”
For Tyler, the finals run was satisfying, considering most of her experience at this stage involved her caddying for her partner, the five-time champion Hoffman.
“I’m pleased,” Tyler said. “It was a lot of fun. Andrea is very good. I tried to play within myself, and I did. I just made a few mistakes, and she didn’t make many. You’ve got to make every putt you look at to beat her. It’s pretty simple.”
NOTES
Lang is the VSGA’s manager of media and communications.