OREGON AMATEUR: Morrison Wins Quarterfinals before Dropping Semis by One

TUALATIN, Ore. – Kelsey Morrison of George Fox University notched a 4-and-3 match-play win over Tiffany Schoning in the quarterfinals of the 103rd Oregon Amateur Women’s Golf Championship Friday morning here at the Tualatin Country Club, but fell by one hole to Kendall Prince in one of two seminfinal matches Friday afternoon.

Morrison, a junior from Yucca Valley, Calif., and an NCAA Division III First Team All-American this past season, never trailed in her match against Schoning, a two-time All-Big Sky Conference performer for Portland State University from Bend, Ore.  Both players parred the first three holes before Morrison took the lead for good with a birdie-3 on the fourth hole. 

A par-5 on the sixth hole and a par-4 on the seventh built Morrison’s lead to three, but Schoning got it back  down to one by the 10th hole.  After each player parred 11 and 12, Morrison won the next three to nail down the win, advancing to the final four against Prince, a native of Corvallis, Ore., and the Big Ten Conference’s Freshman of the Year who had eliminated two other Bruins, Whitney Jammerman and Abby Mann, in the first two rounds of match play. 

Both players opened with par-4’s, then Prince took the lead with a par-4 on number two while Morrison shot a bogey-5.  Prince went 2-up with a par-4 on the fourth hole as Morrison again bogeyed.  On the seventh hole, Morrison hit a par-4 while Prince suffered her first bogey, but Prince went 2-up again with a birdie-4 on the ninth hole to beat Morrison’s par.

The two halved the next five holes, including birdie-3’s on the 11th.  Morrison finally picked up a hole when she birdied the par-3 15th as Prince parred it.  The three closing holes were all par-4’s and both players parred each one, giving them splits on eight of the last nine holes.  It was just enough to put Prince in the finals Saturday at 8:00 a.m. against Amy Beth Simanton of Lake Oswego, Ore., a sophomore at the University of California-Davis.

Complete results of the Oregon Amateur Championship are available on line at Oregon Golf Association web site at http://www.ghintpp.com/oregonga/tpponlinegolfer/Default.aspx?SeasonID=14, or the official Oregon Amateur Championship tournament web site http://oregonamateur.org/.