Leona Maguire
ST. ANDREWS, SCOTLAND (April 30, 2016) - The
Ladies’ Golf Union announced the 2016 Great Britain
and Ireland Curtis Cup Team on Thursday, a team
highlighted by a pair of 21-year-old, three-time
selections in Leona Maguire and Bronte Law. The Great
Britain and Ireland Team will face the USA Team in the
39th Curtis Cup Match, June 10-12 at Dun Laoghaire
Golf Club in Enniskerry, Ireland.
The USA Curtis Cup
Team, which will be captained
by Robin Burke, was named in February. 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.
Maguire, of the Republic of Ireland, is No. 1 in the
Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking™ (WAGR) and
Law, of England, is No. 4. Both accomplished amateurs
were on the last GB&I Team to win the Curtis Cup, a
10½-9½ victory in 2012 at The Nairn Golf Club in
Scotland. Maguire also played in 2010 at Essex County
Club in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Mass., while Law
competed in the 2014 Match at St. Louis (Mo.) Country
Club, a 13-7 victory for the USA.
Charlotte Thomas, 23, of England, is the third
member of the 2016 GB&I Team with previous Curtis
Cup experience, having competed two years ago.
The five newcomers to the GB&I side are Maria
Dunne, 32, of Ireland, Alice Hewson, 18, of England,
Meghan MacLaren, 21, of England, Olivia Mehaffey, 18,
of Northern Ireland, and Rochelle Morris, 20, of
England.
The first reserve is Lianna Bailey, 19, of
England.
“We have an extremely talented team, which has
considerable experience playing amateur golf at the
highest level,” said GB&I captain Elaine Farquharson-
Black, who competed in the 1990 and 1992 Curtis Cup
Matches. “I am looking forward to meeting up with the
team at The Castle Golf Club [in early June] to prepare
for the Match. With some of the best players in the
world on both sides, it is going to be a really exciting
Curtis Cup.”
Six of the eight GB&I players were automatic
selections – the top four in the WAGR as of April 27 and
the leading two players in the LGU’s Order of Merit not
selected from the WAGR – with the final two golfers
picked by the LGU Selection Panel.
The USA leads the series, 28-7-3.
Leona Maguire, a
sophomore at Duke University, was the
recipient of the 2015 Mark H. McCormack Medal, given
annually to the No. 1 men’s and women’s players in the
WAGR. She also won the 2015 Annika Award, given to
the outstanding player in women’s college golf, and was
named Women’s Golf Coaches Association Freshman of
the Year. Along with twin sister Lisa, she competed in
the 2010 Curtis Cup. She has represented Europe in the
Junior Ryder Cup and Junior Solheim Cup matches
against the USA.
Bronte Law, a junior at
UCLA, won the English Women’s
Amateur the past two years and was a runner-up in the
2016 South American Women’s Amateur. She has
represented England in a variety of competitions since
the age of 14, including the Junior Solheim Cup and
Junior Ryder Cup matches. She owns four collegiate
victories for the Bruins. She also advanced to the
quarterfinals of the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur, where
she lost to eventual runner-up and 2016 USA Curtis Cup
competitor Sierra Brooks.
Charlotte Thomas, a
senior at the University of Washington,
posted a 1-2 mark in the 2014 Curtis Cup Match,
defeating Erynne Lee, 2 up, in Sunday singles. She is a
past winner of the English Mid-Amateur Championship
and runner-up in the English Stroke Play. She also was
the champion of the inaugural Annika Invitational at
Mission Hills in Shenzhen, China. At Washington, she
became the first Husky to win in her college debut by
claiming top honors at the 2012 Oregon State
Invitational. This year, she owns one victory and posted
seven top-10 finishes.
Olivia Mehaffey, No. 9
in the WAGR, will be a college
teammate of USA Curtis Cup competitor Monica Vaughn
at Arizona State University this fall. This year, Mehaffey
won the Irish Women’s Open Stroke Play and finished
second in defense of her Helen Holm Scottish Open
Stroke Play title. She represented Europe in the 2015
Junior Solheim Cup. In 2015, she also won the Scottish
and Welsh Open Amateur titles en route to claiming the
LGU Order of Merit to earn a spot in this year’s Ricoh
Women’s British Open.
Maria Dunne, one of two
LGU Selection Panel picks, will
be the oldest player in the Match. She finished third in
the recent Helen Holm Scottish Women’s Open at Royal
Troon. Dunne played college golf at Bethune-Cookman
University in Daytona Beach, Fla. Her achievements this
past year include representing Ireland in the European
Team Championships, winning the Irish Foursomes
Championship with Chloe Ryan, advancing to the
quarterfinals of the 2015 Spanish Women’s Amateur
and the Round of 16 in this year’s Spanish Amateur.
Alice Hewson, a
freshman at Clemson University, has
been a regular winner in Great Britain since claiming the
English Girls’ Under 13 Championship in 2010. She also
won the Scottish Under 16 Stroke Play and the Under
18 prize at the St. Rule Trophy. She has posted two
college victories in her first season for the Lady Tigers.
Meghan MacLaren, a
junior at Florida International
University in Miami, is a past British and Irish Stroke
Play champion and owns eight collegiate victories. She
will represent FIU as an individual in the upcoming
NCAA regionals. She also represented GB&I in the 2015
Vagliano Trophy and represented Europe in the
inaugural Patsy Hankins Trophy against Asia Pacific. Her
top-10 finishes this season include the Helen Holm
Scottish Women’s Open Stroke Play and the South
American Amateur.
Rochelle Morris was the
runner-up in two recent national
championships: the English Women’s Amateur and the
English Women’s Open Stroke Play. She also was
second in The Leveret Trophy and advanced to the
match-play portion of the French Under 21
Championship.