“Oh, Canada!” First All-Canadian USGA Final Comes in 2017 Senior Women’s Amateur Championship

13 September, 2017 – It was an historic day today for our neighbors to the north, at least in golf terms. For the first time in USGA history there will be two Canadian players – Judith Kyrinis and Terrill Samuel – battling it out in the final round of a USGA championship.

Judith Kyrinis and Terrill Samuel celebrate their all-Canadian final after Samuel, left, won in 19 holes during semifinal round of match play of the 2017 U.S. Senior Women's Amateur at Waverley Country Club in Portland, Ore. on Wednesday, Sept. 13, 2017. (Copyright USGA/Steven Gibbons)

The quarterfinal pairings made it mathematically possible, with four Americans and four Canadians in the mix – but with each pairing being USA vs Canada, guaranteeing that no player could eliminate a countrywoman.

The pairings split evenly, with eventual finalist Judith Kyrinis defeating Lisa McGill of Philadelphia, 2 and 1; Tara Fleming of Jersey City prevailing over Mary Ann Hayward of Canada, 3 and 2; the other eventual finalist Terrill Samuel eliminating Olympic Club member Patricia Cornett of Mill Valley, California, 5 and 3; and Honolulu’s Patricia Schremmer defeating Canadian Jackie Little, 2 and 1.

With a pair of international matches set up in the semifinals, it was again possible for a single-nation final to come about, and that’s exactly what happened.

Judith Kyrinis, of Toronto, went down to her American opponent early in the match, falling three behind Tara Fleming, a former LPGA Tour player who is now a reinstated amateur, by the fourth hole. Three wins late in the round allowed Kyrinis, 53, a registered nurse with three children, to square the match at the tenth hole before falling back at the eleventh with a bogey-4 to Fleming’s birdie. A win two holes later, and another pair of wins at the 16th and 17th holes gave the win to the Canadian

Toronto’s Terrill Samuel, 56, who had her 80-year-old mother on the bag, went four down to Patricia Schremmer, 51, of Honolulu – another former LPGA Tour player and reinstated amateur – after Schremmer won four holes straight, starting with #4. After splitting the last two holes of the front nine birdie-par, Samuel got one hole back at #10, and three holes later won a string of three straight, squaring the match at the fifteenth hole. Three more holes saw the pair finish regulation still square, Samuel winning on the first extra hole with a birdie to Schremmer’s par, clinching the pairing for the historic final.

Samuel had to get past Salinas, California, native Dr Patricia Cornett, 63, who now lives in Mill Valley, to advance out of the quarterfinal round. Cornett, a Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, who specializes in the field of non-malignant hematology, is an accomplished amateur golfer with a long history of USGA competition. Cornett has played in 60 USGA championships, beginning with the 1971 Girls’ Junior, at age 17, and was on two U.S. Curtis Cup squads – 1978 and 1988 – before taking the helm as captain in 2012.

One of the two finalists will join countrywomen Marlene Stewart Streit and Gayle Borthwick as Canadian champions of the U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur. Streit, the most recent Canadian to win the championship, in 2003, also won in 1985 and 1994; Borthwick is a two-time champion, winning the championship in 1996 and 1998.