Kentucky PGA Junior Tour’s major championship season begins this week in Richmond.

RICHMOND, KY (May 30, 2022) – The opening months of the Kentucky PGA Junior Tour’s season have seen some dazzling golf from some of the state’s top young talent. This week, they will take the major championship stage for the first time in 2022 and compete in one of the crown jewels of Kentucky Junior Golf.

Richmond will be the destination for the Kentucky Junior PGA Championships, continuing a tradition that has been established in the last several years. Once more, all girls and 9-hole boys will compete at The University Club at Arlington while five miles down the street, 18-hole boys will tee it up at Gibson Bay Golf Course. The action from Arlington will begin on Tuesday, May 31 and conclude on Wednesday, June 1. Competition at Gibson Bay will start on Wednesday and finish on Thursday, June 2.

Stroke play will be the format utilized to decide the first major champions of 2022. One round will be played on each day from both venues to determine who will take the trophies. The top-two finishers in the Girls 16-18 and Boys 16-18 Divisions will also secure spots in the fields of the National Junior PGA Championships, which are set to take place just outside of Chicago, Illinois at Cog Hill Golf & Country Club on August 2-5.

Some of the notable names in the Girls 16-18 Division at The University Club at Arlington include the following. Their starting times in Tuesday’s opening round are listed in parenthesis. Each of these players will start on hole 10.

• Cathryn Brown (8:20 a.m. EDT) – Set to begin her college career with the Kentucky Wildcats this fall, this is Brown’s final summer in the junior ranks. It’s been a successful career, which last year alone featured top-four finishes in the Kentucky Girls Junior Amateur and KHSAA Girls State Championship. She is the brother of the late Cullan Brown, who also competed with UK before his passing.
• Macie Brown (8:50 a.m.) – Brown won this competition in 2020 with ease and posted a third-place finish in 2021. In October, she won the KHSAA Girls State Championship at Bowling Green Country Club by five strokes, further submitting her spot as one of the top females playing golf in Kentucky right now. She has committed to play college golf with the Vanderbilt Commodores.
• Emma Lindemoen (9:40 a.m.) – The reigning Lou Perry Tour Championship winner, that victory at her come course of Hunting Creek Country Club marked Lindemoen’s first major title on Tour. She has picked up two wins so far in 2022 which came at the Spring Classic and the Kentucky Junior Four-Ball Championship alongside Cailyn Rogers.
• Claira Beth Ramsey (8:30 a.m.) – The runner-up in this tournament last year where her final round 70 (-2) was the low round of the tournament. That round started with an opening nine score of 32 (-4), so Ramsey is clearly comfortable at Arlington having played it many times as a Richmond native. She went from second place to first in the ensuing major last season by winning the Kentucky Girls Junior Amateur at Bardstown Country Club.
• Cailyn Rogers (9:20 a.m.) – Rogers was one of four golfers named as a 2022 Gay Brewer, Jr. Grant recipient and the lone female to receive that honor this year. She won the Girls 13-15 Division title in this event in 2020 and posted a top-ten finish last year when she made her debut start in the Girls 16-18 Division. More recently, she was the medalist at last week’s U.S. Girls Junior Qualifier at Cherry Blossom Golf Club and posted the only even-par score of the tournament.
• Athena Singh (8:10 a.m.) – Singh has been unstoppable this season, winning each Kentucky PGA Junior Tour event she has competed in. Her perfect beginning to the year began at the Season Kickoff and continued through her more recent starts at the Lexington Junior City Championship and Junior Falls Cities. She has won by at least four shots each time.

Click here to view the first-round tee times at The University Club at Arlington

The field at Gibson Bay is just as stacked for the Boys 16-18 competition. Names to keep an eye on include these players. Their opening round tee times on Wednesday along with the hole they will start on are listed in parenthesis.

• Hayden Adams (8:10 a.m. EDT off #1) – A past major winner on Tour, Adams won the Kentucky Boys Junior Amateur in 2020 with a chip-in for birdie on the first hole of a sudden-death playoff. He was the first-round leader of this tournament in 2021 with a 67 (-5).
• Luke Coyle (9:50 a.m. off #1) – Always a popular pick to win when he’s in the field, the future college golfer with the Alabama Crimson Tide is still pursuing his first major on the Kentucky PGA Junior Tour. He did get a big victory last September, however, with the KGCA All-State Championship when he opened up that final round by shooting 28 (-8) on the front nine at University Club of Kentucky – Big Blue.
• Bradford Lacefield (8:10 a.m. off #1) – Lacefield was a competitor in the Drive, Chip & Putt National Finals in 2021. This will be his first time competing in the event’s top division, but he finished T4 in the Boys 13-15 competition last year at Gibson Bay.
• Jacob Settles (9:20 a.m. off #10) – A breakout player in 2021, Settles is the most recent major winner on the boys’ side having won the Lou Perry Tour Championship by an eye-popping twelve shots last July. He was one of the players named as a Gay Brewer, Jr. recipient earlier this month.
• Warren Thomis (9:50 a.m. off #1) – The only golfer to receive both the Gay Brewer, Jr. and Justin Thomas Grants this year. Thomis’ high quality of play has certainly warranted that distinction, with a victory in this event in 2020 by seven shots aiding in that. He was also the runner-up in last fall’s KHSAA Boys State Championship.
• Trey Wall (10:00 a.m. off #1) – One of the more recent winners on Tour, Wall picked up a victory at the Independence Bank Western Kentucky Junior Championship. That is one of three starts he has made this year and all of them have been top-five finishes. That has helped him get to second place in the Player of the Year Standings, trailing…
• Hayden Wasch (8:30 a.m. off #1) – The leader of the Player of the Year standings thus far, Wasch won the Season Kickoff and was a runner-up at the Spring Classic. He also has the Tour’s lone hole-in-one to this point in the season, having jarred it on the 2^nd hole at Kearney Hill Golf Links in the first round of the Lexington Junior City Championship.
• Zach Watterson (8:30 a.m. off #10) – Of the three players who tied for first in this championship last year, Watterson is the only one in the field this year. He was part of the thrilling finish that resulted in him, Cayden Pope and Rylan Wotherspoon ending in a tie after regulation. He’s made one start on Tour this season which was a runner-up finish at the Lexington Junior City Championship.
• Tyler Wirth (9:10 a.m. off #1) – Wirth is the only player to this point in the Boys 16-18 Division to record multiple wins on Tour so far this season. His first time getting in the winner’s circle came at the Kentucky Junior Four-Ball Championship alongside Isaac Moody, and he then got a solo victory at the Junior Falls Cities when he won Louisville’s premier junior tournament by two strokes.
• Rocco Zakutney (1:00 p.m. off #10) – Set to make his final start in this tournament as a recent high school graduate, Zakutney is one of the top players to have not won this championship previously. His game has proven to hold up in non-junior competitions, evidenced by a runner-up finish at Golf House Kentucky Classic #1 presented by Mobile Pro Shop in April and one of six players to advance out of Kentucky’s 2021 U.S. Open Local Qualifier.

Click here to view the first-round tee times at Gibson Bay Golf Course

Kentucky Junior Golf will have full coverage of the Kentucky Junior PGA Championships on its Facebook, Instagram and Twitter pages. The final hole of the final group in the Girls 16-18 will be live-streamed during its final round on Wednesday while the same will be done for the Boys 16-18 Division on Thursday. Any playoffs necessary to decide those titles will also be live-streamed.

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About Kentucky Junior Golf:
Kentucky Junior Golf is part of the Kentucky Golf Foundation, one of three organizations that comprises Golf House Kentucky. Kentucky Junior Golf includes the state’s top tournaments and programs for the state’s golfers aged 18 or younger, featuring the Kentucky PGA Junior Tour, Youth on Course, the Youth on Course caddie program, PGA Jr. League, and Drive, Chip & Putt. Kentucky Junior Golf is dedicated to introducing Kentucky’s youth to the game of golf, providing resources to further enjoyment within the sport, and developing the skills necessary for players to thrive both on and off the golf course.

Media Contact:
Ethan Fisher, PGA | Golf House Kentucky | efisher@kygolf.org | (502) 792-9703