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Blumenherst Falls In Finals Of U.S. Women?s Amateur
CARMEL, IND.-- Duke University’s Amanda Blumenherst had her stellar run at the 2007 U.S. Women’s Amateur come to a close on Sunday afternoon as she fell in the finals 1up to Maria Jose Uribe at the 6,595-yard, Par 72 Crooked Stick Golf Club in Carmel, Ind.
Neither player was up by more than one hole the entire 36-hole match-play final round and were even going into the next-to-last hole.
Both tee shots landed on the green, but Blumenherst’s first putt from 20 feet was about eight feet too long. She then missed her par putt to give Uribe an opening. Uribe missed her first putt to the right but tapped in for a par three and the lead going into the final hole. The three-putt was Blumenherst’s only one of the day.
“I definitely got out of my game,” Blumenherst said about her putting. “I thought she was going to make it. I thought I needed to. And I wanted it. I had lipped so many putts today that I almost forced it. I said, all right, I’m going to make one putt. I just hit it way too hard. And then I just missed the putt coming back.”
On the 412-yard, par-4 final hole, Blumenherst’s long putt from the fringe was about two feet to the right. Uribe holed her putt from six feet for the championship.
Blumenherst, who grew up in Fort Wayne, Ind., and lives in Scottsdale, Ariz., dominated her past three matches, never having to play past the 15th hole, but just couldn’t get her putting going on the final day.
“I felt like I was putting great strokes on them but they just didn’t go in,” Blumenherst said. “It was frustrating.”
Blumenherst went 1-up with a 20-foot birdie putt on the seventh hole, which was the 25th hole of the day. But she lost the lead two holes later when a drive out of bounds forced her to drop another ball for a penalty and eventually finished with a bogey on the par five she had birdied earlier in the morning.
Blumenherst regained the lead on the next hole when her second shot stopped dead a foot from the hole and Uribe conceded the birdie. Blumenherst missed makable putts on each of the next three holes, and Uribe went 1-up with a six-foot birdie putt on the par three 31st hole. Blumenherst tied the match for the final time after Uribe drove out of bounds with five holes remaining.
During the first 18 holes Sunday, Blumenherst continued the steady play she had shown all week but never led by more than one hole. She birdied the par five, 502-yard 11th hole, but Uribe did her one better, hitting a 30-foot putt for an eagle to tie the match again.
Blumenherst sank a curling, 35-foot downhill putt on No. 16, her fifth birdie of the match. But Uribe’s 16-foot birdie putt on No. 18 squared the match again going into the final 18 holes.
Even though Blumenherst lost, she still maintains her excellent attitude, “It’s only a golf tournament, I guess. I mean, it’s a big one, but there will be plenty more in the future. I’ve had a successful career so far. I mean, runner-up, sure, I would have loved to have won. But it was a long week of golf, and I played well. So I can’t be too upset with myself.”
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