Pacific Northwest players make strong showing at USGA Senior Women’s Am

Not only was the Pacific Northwest well represented when it came to hosting the 2026 USGA Senior Women’s Amateur Championship, but several of the players involved came from the NW as well.

The Portland Golf Club served as a terrific host for the tournament – and played hard through the two days of stroke play and the days of match play.

China’s Xiaolong (Sherry) Zhong won the tournament over Amadine Vincent in the championship match, but along the way the Northwest showed that it had some solid senior amateur women players as well.

Portland’s Lara Tennant has become a fixture in this tournament having won it multiple times and nearly did again this year at the Portland Golf Club.

Tennant breezed through the two qualifying rounds with a two-round total of 10 over par finished tied for 12th. She did have a struggle in the round of 64 match play having to survive a 23-match in the opening round to move on. In the round of 32 Tennant won 1-up and then was victorious 3&2 in the round of 16. In the quarterfinals Tennant won 2&1 to move onto the semifinals. In the semifinals she ran into the top seed Zhong and lost a close 1-up match. Tennant has a match play record of 31-7 in this event and earned an exemption into next year’s championship.

Tina Papatolis of Issaquah finished eighth in the stroke play and made it to match play. She won her first round match play 6&4 but fell in the round of 32 in 20 holes to fall out of the tournament.

There were several other players from the Pacific Northwest who took part in the tournament. In fact, Tennant’s sister Cappy Mack played but did not survive the cut. Others to play but not make the cut into match play included Leslie Folsom of Seattle, Kim Shek of Bellevue, Loree McKay of Portland, Gretchen Klein of Hoquiam and Ginny Burkey of Eugene.