Amateur Wins LPGA Event...Kind Of

Arkansas student golfer Stacy Lewis was declared the winner of the LPGA Northwest Arkansas Championship on Sunday after Tour officials deemed that the event would be 18 holes and money earned would not count toward the money list.

From the AP copy:

The LPGA Tour shortened the event from 54 holes to 18, setting up a bizarre finish on a nearly empty course at Pinnacle Country Club. Only 32 players hadn’t finished when play resumed Sunday, and the final day was closed to the public.

“From the LPGA’s standpoint, this is not a tournament,” said Doug Brecht, the LPGA’s vice president of rules and officials. “It’s extremely unfortunate, obviously, for a lot of different reasons. ... It’s obviously not official, and we just don’t consider it an event at all.”

It would have been great to see if Stacy could become the first amateur to win officially on the LPGA Tour since 1969. But, this is still a pretty cool story that deserves being passed along.

There has been spectulation that since 11 Solheim Cup participants were in the event this week that the LPGA Tour was not interested in trying to shoot for a late Sunday finish with a 36 hole event. That's probably in part true, especially considering that a LPGA meteorologist said playing on Sunday was do-able. Still, only 8 holes had to be prepped for the Sunday finale to the first and only round. With hardly anyone on the course aside from those who had to play, it was much easier to manage. Who knows how things would have panned out had they tried to complete a second round to make it official.

Still, congratulations to Stacy Lewis on a professional win...in which she receives no money and it will be recorded as never having really happened. Just read the first part of that sentence, Stacy!