Taking stroke play medalist honors last weekend in the Women’s Championship Division of the 2013 San Francisco City Championship was only the first step on the road to a coveted title for Livermore’s Casie Cathrea; four rounds of single-elimination match play remained before a victor would be crowned.
The 17-year-old high school senior negotiated the second hurdle successfully Sunday, March 4th, defeating 16-seed Nancy Xu, a senior at St Francis High School (Mountain View) 3 and 2 in the first round of match play at Harding Park Golf Course.
The round was not without tension, even for match play, as Xu’s caddy – her father, according to reports – insisted that Cathrea hole out nearly a dozen short putts of six inches or less. Putts of less than a foot are customarily conceded in match play, at least in the early part of a match, so the insistence on holing out so many virtual tap-ins is a rather flagrant flaunting of match-play etiquette.
Cathrea, an accomplished junior golfer who will be joining the Oklahoma State University Cowgirls squad next fall, handled the breach of etiquette with her usual aplomb, posting the following message on Facebook after the match: “Winner winner chicken dinner. I love match play. Note to parent caddy of other player – the 11 - 6" or less putts I made were great practice to help with my distance issues.”
The Livermore teen will face #8-seed Nicolette Bondura of El Dorado Hills, a freshman on the CSU-Sacramento Hornets women’s golf team, next Saturday, March 9th, in a quarterfinal match at Harding Park Golf Course.
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