Ole Miss Teammates Linder, Miller Among Semifinalists at Daniel Island Club

The first double session of match play in the 11th U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship at Daniel Island Club’s Ralston Creek Course brought plenty of pageantry with four sides emerging from a Tuesday’s marathon day of golf to reach the semifinals.

University of Mississippi teammates Sophie Linder and Mary Miller’s path was nothing short of heroic. The duo showed no fear facing off against medalists and U.S. National Junior Team members Jude Lee and Nikki Oh, recording nine birdies during the Round-of-16 matchup, including consecutive birdies on No. 17 and 18 to close out a 2-up victory.

During the 16th seeds’ quarterfinal contest, Linder, 21, of Carthage, Tenn., and Miller, 20, of Savannah, Ga., struck first with a birdie on the par-5 third hole, but their advantage quickly diminished as Chuang, of Los Angeles, Calif., and Xu, from the People’s Republic of China, tied the match with a win on No. 5. From there, the competitors continued to match each other’s pace, each rattling off birdies on Nos. 7, 11 and 15, as the match reached the penultimate hole tied. With the tees moved forward on the reachable 266-yard par-4, Linder launched a 250-yard drive followed by an emphatic chip-in for eagle, giving the Ole Miss roommates a 1-up lead, before securing the match with a conceded birdie putt on the 18th for a 2-up win.  

“They moved the tee shot up to make it drivable,” said Linder about setting up her heroic shot, "So I'm like okay, still sent it up there, got around the green, both of us. I ended up trusting my shot, and it went in. It was just a really cool experience to see that go in. Took it down to 18 and finished it off.”

Also advancing to the last four were U.S. National Team member Grace Carter and fellow Floridan Alexandra Snyder along with collegians Katelyn Huber (University of Florida) and Haley Davis (Florida State). One quarterfinal match was suspended on the 21st hole. Morgan Ellison and Katie Scheck will return to the course on Wednesday morning at 7:15 a.m. EDT to complete the match against Mississippi teens Lucy Cook and Eliza Yelverton. The winner faces Davis and Huber.

Carter and Snyder had to wait more than three hours between their Round-of-16 win and their quarterfinal encounter against reinstated amateurs Jordy LaBarbera and Sarah Thomas, after the mid-amateurs took down the first-cousin tandem of Elle Nachmann and Juno Taino in dramatic fashion. That Round-of-16 match was stretched to 24 holes before being decided by a 96-yard hole-out eagle-3 on the par-5 sixth, setting a record for the longest match in championship history.

After winning their morning match over Annika Raja and Sabrina Sun, 6 and 5, Carter and Snyder took advantage of the extra rest between matches by relaxing and enjoying some candy. Then the duo went out and registered three consecutive birdies from No. 1 for a quick 2-up lead. After tying the next four holes, the 15-year-old Floridians birdied two of the next three before an eagle on the par-5 11th extended the margin to 5 up. They added another birdie on the par-3 12th to close out the afternoon with another 6-and-5 victory, matching the championship's largest margin of victory in the quarterfinals.

"I think we've been able to get the momentum pretty quickly,” said Carter, a first-year member of the U.S. National Junior Team who reached the semifinals of the 2025 U.S. Girls’ Junior. “The start of the round, we made a couple putts.”

Snyder added: “We made a few birdies at the start, which helped us get up pretty early. Then, we kind of kept that momentum through the round. We were making a bunch of putts when we needed to. [Carter's] a great partner, so we had a lot of fun”

Hannah Hall and Iris Lee, who survived a grueling 22-hole, Round-of-32 match against Kathryn DeLoach and Elizabeth Sullivan on Monday, lost their quarterfinal matchup, 1 down, to Haley Davis and Katelyn Huber.

Facing a 3-down deficit with nine holes to go, Huber, 19, of Gainesville, Fla., and Davis, 19, of Ocala, Fla., mounted a remarkable comeback, first winning the 11th hole with a 36-foot eagle putt from Huber, then tying the match by making consecutive birdies on Nos. 14 and 15, before finally going ahead with another eagle on the drivable 17th, where Huber found the green off the tee and drained a 15-foot putt. 

“I just didn't want to lose,” said Davis, a sophomore at Florida State University, who credited the comeback to enjoying a banana on No. 11. “I was like, ‘we're not losing this thing.’ And like Katelyn said yesterday, she's a pretty good back nine player. So we basically had to make one putt, and then everything started falling in. That's kind of what we did.”

The final match of the afternoon saw Lucy Cook and Eliza Yelverton, both of West Point, Miss., face off against the No. 3-seeded side of Morgan Ellison (23) and Katie Scheck (23).

Cook and Yelverton, both 19 and high-school teammates from Oak Hill Academy (Miss.), broke a tie with back-to-back birdies on Nos. 14 and 15 to go 2-up, but Ellison and Scheck responded on the very next hole with a birdie on No. 16 to cut their deficit to 1-down. The momentum continued to shift in Ellison and Scheck’s direction, as Ellison stuffed her approach shot on the 18th to six feet, burying a clutch birdie to tie the match. The foursome went into a playoff, where holes 19 and 20 were halved before darkness suspended play ahead of No. 21 with the match set to resume Wednesday morning at 7:15 a.m.

What’s Next

Match play concludes on Wednesday with the semifinals and 18-hole final, with the first match teeing off at 7:30 a.m. EDT and the second at 7:45 a.m. The final match is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m. Admission is free and spectators are encouraged to attend.

Notable

• By making the quarterfinals, Kandice Chuang and Nina Xu; Jordy LaBarbera and Sarah Thomas; Hannah Hall and Iris Lee are all exempt into the 2027 U.S. Women's Amateur Four-Ball at Farmington Country Club, in Charlottesville, Va. Semifinalists receive a two-year exemption with the same provisions. Both sides must remain intact.
  
  
• One day after a 22-hole record-tying match in the Round-of-32, a new record was set for the longest match in championship history, as Jordy LaBarbera and Sarah Thomas recorded a 24-hole victory over Elle Nachmann and Juno Taino.
  
  
• With stroke-play medalists Jude Lee and Nikki Oh being eliminated in the Round of 16, it meant that only two medalists have won this championship in its 11 iterations. Natalie Yen and Asia Young were co-medalists with Janae and Jasmine Leovao when they won a year ago in Oklahoma, and Furman teammates Alice Chen and Taylor Totland captured the title in 2017.
  
  
• In 12 of the matches on Tuesday, the lower seed advanced 11 times. The lone exception being No. 3 seeds Morgan Ellison and Katie Scheck, who won, 1 up, over Indiana natives Ressie Lemmon and Talor Snively in the Round of 16. Their quarterfinal match against Lucy Cook and Eliza Yelverton was suspended on the 21st hole due to darkness.
  
  
• Jordy LaBarbera and Sarah Thomas were the lone mid-amateurs remaining in the field. No mid-amateur individual or side has yet to win the U.S. Women’s Four-Ball.
  
  
• After seeing only two eagles during stroke play and Monday’s opening round of match play, five were recorded on Tuesday, including two from the side of Haley Davis and Katelyn Huber on Holes 11 and 17, which were the courses’ most eagled holes of the day with 3 and 2, respectively.

Quotable

“It was good energy flowing back and forth with the birdies and all in the first round. Like [Sophie Linder] said, we tried to take that into the second round. We kind of did that in the beginning. Halfway through we were 1-down. We tried to stick to the plan and stay positive, and we knew we'd have more opportunities, and we made those coming down the stretch.” Mary Miller reflecting on her Round of 16 and quarterfinal matches on Tuesday afternoon

“We had about 96 [yards] to the pin, wind was into us, and I actually had that same shot earlier today on the same hole [No. 6] and I hit it long; so this time around I was like, ‘we need to hit this close cause we’d been struggling to hit birdie putts the last six holes,’ and it got a really good bounce and fed straight into the hole.” - Sarah Thomas on her match-sealing eagle on the 24th hole.

“It's probably the most fun I've ever had in a tournament. I think it helps a lot, just like having team chemistry. We both know we're trying. Everything's good.” - Grace Carter on playing in the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball alongside Alexandra Snyder.

“Bananas get me going. I had a banana on 11 and eagled 11. Like Haley [Davis] said, we didn't make anything on the front. We missed a par putt that was crucial on nine, and that made us go 3 down. But yeah, I ate a banana. That's the short answer.” - Katelyn Huber on what fueled the duo’s back-nine turnaround

“We were basically in the locker room collecting candy for the next day when we weren't playing. I think the time flew pretty fast. The chicken tenders were really good today. Shout out to the chef.” - Grace Carter on how her and Alexandra Snyder spent their time waiting for their quarterfinal match to begin