Maggie Zhang Wins B.C. Bantam Girls Championship In Convincing Fashion
By Brad Ziemer, British Columbia Golf
BOWEN ISLAND (August 29, 2024) - It was not a question of whether Maggie Zhang would win the B.C. Bantam Girls Championship at Bowen Island Golf Club, but rather what her margin of victory would be.
The 13-year-old Richmond resident had opened up an eight-shot lead following a first-round 73 and when she opened her final round with a birdie, it became clear that everyone else was playing for second place.
A very distant second place, as it turned out.
Zhang carded an even-par 70 and her three-over par total for the 36-hole tournament for players aged 14 and under beat the rest of the field by 14 shots.
Zhang clearly did not have any issues playing with a big lead. “Well, I wasn’t as nervous as normal,” she said. “I had an eight-shot lead and I was like, I am just going to play my own game and try and shoot a good score and make myself happy. That worked out pretty well.”
Zhang finished her round in impressive fashion. She almost holed out her approach shot to the par 4 18th hole. Her nine-iron from 116 yards ended up a foot from the hole. She tapped in the short putt to finish her round the way it started — with a birdie. “It was a nice way to finish,” she said.
Zhang and her family recently arrived from China, where she has played most of her junior golf. The Bantam championship was just her fifth tournament in Canada. She finished fifth at last week’s B.C. Juvenile Girls (U17) Championship at Blue Ocean Golf Club in Sechelt.
She came to Bowen Island feeling like she had a good chance to win, but was surprised by her margin of victory. “It was easier than I thought, to be honest,” she said. “I was prepared for it to be really competitive.”
Zhang plays out of Savage Creek in Richmond and is about to enter Grade 8. She said she enjoyed Bowen Island’s challenging nine-hole layout. “It’s a very interesting course,” she said. “It can be frustrating if you don’t play well. The course is slopey and the greens are fast with lots of slope. I was trying to find where the mountains were and that helped me a lot. I also tried to keep my ball below the hole. Uphill putts are much easier.”
That race for second place was won by Ari Tûr of West Vancouver. Tûr closed with a six-over 76 to finish at 17-over par. That was three shots better than Freya Song of West Vancouver.
A Novice Championship for players aged 12 and under was also contested at Bowen Island. Quorra Mi of Burnaby won that championship by three shots over Jodi Li of Burnaby. Velvet Haynes of Kelowna was third.
Mi and Li also combined to win the event’s net better-ball competition. Their 16-under total was two shots better than the team of Bentley Hoogerdyk of Victoria and Emma Kim of Surrey.
Click HERE for complete final scoring.