The 2016 USA Curtis Cup Team
FAR HILLS, N.J. (
Feb. 23,
2016) – Hannah O’Sullivan, of
Chandler, Ariz., the 2015 U.S. Women’s
Amateur champion, was among the eight players
named today by the United States Golf Association
(USGA) to the USA Team for the 2016 Curtis Cup
Match, to be conducted
June 10-
12 at Dun Laoghaire Golf Club in Enniskerry,
Ireland, outside Dublin.
The players listed below. Please click on the
player's name for a complete rankings profile.
- Sierra Brooks, 17,
of Sorrento, Fla.
- Mariel Galdiano,
17, of Pearl City, Hawaii
- Andrea Lee, 17, of
Hermosa Beach, Calif.
- Mika Liu, 17, of Beverly
Hills, Calif.
- Hannah
O’Sullivan, 17, of Chandler, Ariz.
- Bailey Tardy, 19, of
Peachtree Corners, Ga.
- Monica Vaughn, 21,
of Reedsport, Ore.
- Bethany Wu, 19, of
Diamond Bar, Calif.
“These eight young women who will
represent the United States in the 39th Curtis Cup
Match are among the most talented players in the
world,” said Diana Murphy, USGA president.
“The USGA is proud to have them as
ambassadors for the game, and we wish them the
best of luck as they prepare for the competition in
June.”
The Curtis Cup Match is a biennial international
women’s amateur golf competition between
eight-player teams from the United States of
America and Great Britain and Ireland (GB&I).
It consists of six foursomes (alternate-shot)
matches, six four-ball matches and eight singles
matches over three days of competition. The
USGA’s International Team Selection (ITS)
Committee selects the USA Team, while the
Ladies’ Golf Union selects the GB&I
Team.
“The opportunity to select the members
of this team was one we undertook with great
care,” said Tom Hough, of Atlanta, who is in
his first year as chairman of the ITS Committee and
third year on the USGA Executive Committee.
“We are confident that, while these players
will be fierce competitors, they will also embody the
tradition of friendship set forth by Margaret and
Harriot Curtis in 1932.”
All eight players on the USA Team are among
the top 30 of the Women’s World Amateur
Golf Ranking™, with O’Sullivan (No. 2),
Brooks (No. 4), Galdiano (No. 6) and Tardy (No. 7)
in the top 10.
O’Sullivan won the 2015 U.S.
Women’s Amateur by a 3-and-2 margin over
Brooks at Portland (Ore.) Golf Club. Earlier in the
year, she won the Symetra Tour’s Gateway
Classic, becoming the tour’s first amateur
winner since Kellee Booth in 1999 and the youngest
since Cristie Kerr in 1995. She also earned victories
in the 2015 Rolex Girls Junior Championship and
2015 Rolex Tournament of Champions.
O’Sullivan partnered with Robynn Ree to
finish runner-up to Liu and Rinko Mitsunaga in the
2015 U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball at
Bandon Dunes, and she finished tied for 53rd in the
2015 U.S. Women’s Open at Lancaster (Pa.)
Country Club. O’Sullivan, who qualified for
the 2012 U.S. Women’s Open at age 14, will
enroll at the University of Southern California in the
fall.
Brooks earned victories last year in the South
Atlantic Women’s Amateur (the Sally) and
Women’s Southern Amateur, and was a
semifinalist in the Polo Golf Junior Classic, an event
she won in 2014. Brooks will start her freshman year
at Wake Forest University this fall.
Galdiano captured victories in the 2015 Joanne
Winter Arizona Silver Belle Championship and the
2015 Canadian Women’s Amateur
Championship. She also earned runner-up finishes in
the 2015 Junior PGA Championship and 2015 Polo
Golf Junior Classic. Galdiano competed in the 2011,
2013 and 2015 U.S. Women’s Opens, with her
best finish a tie for 42nd in 2015. She will enroll at
UCLA in the fall.
Lee won the 2014 Rolex Tournament of
Champions and the 2014 Yani Tseng Invitational.
That same year, she reached the semifinals of the
U.S. Women’s Amateur, the quarterfinals of
the U.S. Girls’ Junior and tied for 69th in the
U.S. Women’s Open. Lee earned a silver
medal for the USA in the 2015 Pan American Games,
and the next week she again reached the U.S.
Girls’ Junior quarterfinals. She will start her
freshman year at Stanford University in the fall.
Liu teamed with Mitsunaga to win the inaugural
U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball
Championship in 2015. She kicked off the 2016
season with a win in the Sally Tournament. Her other
victories over the last two years include the 2014
Women’s Southern Amateur, the 2014
Women’s Western Amateur and the 2015
Thunderbird Invitational Junior, and she notched
runner-up finishes in the 2015 Ione D. Jones/Doherty
Amateur, the 2015 Women’s Eastern Amateur
and the 2015 Rolex Tournament of Champions. Liu,
who reached the quarterfinals of the 2015 U.S.
Women’s Amateur and the 2015 U.S.
Girls’ Junior, has verbally committed to
attend Stanford in the fall of 2017.
Tardy won the 2015 North & South
Women’s Amateur Championship over Wu,
rallying from 2 down with two to play to prevail in 20
holes. She reached the third round of match play in
the 2015 U.S. Women’s Amateur, and in 2014
she qualified for the U.S. Women’s Open.
Tardy is a freshman at the University of Georgia,
where she earned her first collegiate win, in the
2015 Windy City Collegiate, in only her fourth start.
Vaughn is a junior at Arizona State University,
where she has victories in the 2016 Northrop
Grumman Regional Challenge and the 2015 Ping/ASU
Invitational. As a sophomore, she finished fifth in the
individual competition of the 2015 NCAA Division I
Women’s Golf Championship.
Wu was runner-up in the 2015 North &
South Women’s Amateur and the 2015
Canadian Women’s Amateur, and reached the
semifinals of the 2015 U.S. Women’s
Amateur. She was a quarterfinalist in the 2014 U.S.
Girls’ Junior and earned medalist honors in
the 2014 U.S. Women’s Amateur, the same
year she successfully defended her Annika
Invitational victory. Wu is a freshman at UCLA.
The alternates for the USA Team are, in order of
ranking: Lauren Kim, 21, of Los Altos, Calif.; and
Caroline Inglis, 22, of Eugene, Ore.
Robin Burke, the 1997 U.S. Women’s
Amateur runner-up and a member of the victorious
1998 USA Curtis Cup Team, will serve as USA
captain.
"It's exciting to have the team
announced,” said Burke. “I'm looking
forward to bringing the players together for practice
and creating positive energy for the Match in June.
This is a remarkable group of players – all very
talented, all proud to represent the United States.
I'm not sure Ireland is ready for us, but we will be
ready for Ireland!”
Elaine Farquharson-Black will serve as
GB&I captain. Farquharson-Black, a native of
Scotland, represented GB&I in the 1990 and
1992 Curtis Cup Matches.
The USA won the 2014 Match at St. Louis (Mo.)
Country Club, 13-7, and leads the overall series, 28-
7-3. The GB&I Team won the 2012 Match at The
Nairn Golf Club in Scotland, the last time the Match
was played on GB&I soil, to halt a streak of
seven consecutive victories for the USA. Prior to
that, the USA had not lost since the 1996 Match at
Killarney Golf and Field Club, the only other time the
biennial competition has been held in the Republic of
Ireland.
Notable past USA Curtis Cup Team members
include U.S. Women’s Open champions
JoAnne Gunderson Carner, Paula Creamer, Juli
Inkster, Kerr, Patty Sheehan, Hollis Stacy and
Michelle Wie, as well as past and present LPGA stars
such as Beth Daniel, Jessica Korda, Stacy Lewis,
Nancy Lopez, Dottie Pepper and Lexi Thompson.