Around the Green

Winans Holds Slim Lead at Seventh Texas Girls' Invitational

MONTGOMERY, Texas – Richardson’s Libby Winans carded a 1-under-par 71 in the seventh annual Texas Girls’ Invitational and holds a slim, one-shot lead heading into Sunday’s final round at Bentwater Yacht & Country Club.

Conducted by the Legends Junior Tour, The Texas Girls’ Invitational is being held on the Weiskopf Course at Bentwater Yacht & Country Club for the fourth time. Bentwater has hosted the championship five consecutive years. The 2015 Championship was played on the Miller Course while the Weiskopf course was being renovated.

The 72-player international field is playing the newly renovated Weiskopf course at 6,083 yards. Saturday’s first round had mostly sunny skies with 15-20 mph winds with gusts up to 30 mph. With several holes wrapping around beautiful Lake Conroe, south winds challenge players as they play the back nine.

Winans, 15, carded the only under-par round of the day Saturday, although it didn’t start out as she had hoped.

“I played the first couple of holes shaky,” Winans said.

She bogeyed her first hole, the 358-yard, par-4 10^th hole. She then made a double-bogey on the most difficult hole of the day, the split-fairway, 12^th hole. She was up-and-down the rest of her opening nine, carding three birdies and two more bogeys, but then things turned around on her back nine.

“I started making putts on the back nine (her front nine),” she said. “I wanted to birdie both par-5’s but only birdied one. I made up for it with a birdie on the par-4 fifth hole.”

Her bogey free back-nine included another birdie on the 355-yard, par 4 sixth hole. Her 3-under-par 33 got her to 1-under 71 and one stroke ahead of the field heading into Sunday.

Hailey Jones, reigning LJT Girls Player of the Year, and Austin’s Jensen Jalufka  sit one shot back in a tie for second place. Both girls will be paired with Winans for Sunday’s final round at Bentwater.

Magnolia’s Ava Schwienteck and Houston’s Courtney Bryant are tied for fourth place after carding 1-over 73’s. They sit two shots back of Winans. Elina Sinz, Gurleen Kaur, Julia Gregg, and Taylor Mieras sit three shots back tied for sixth place.

The shot of the day belonged to Elle Fox of Copperas Cove, Texas, who made a hole-in-one on the 165-yard 14^th hole. Fox, who started on hole No. 10 on Saturday finished her first round with an overall score of 5-over 77.

With a crowded leaderboard, several players will be fighting to be named the Texas Girls’ Invitational Champion and get her name engraved on the ‘Nez Muhleman Trophy. Muhleman has been a staple in girls’ junior golf in the Houston area for more than 30 years.

The final round of the Texas Girls’ Invitational is scheduled to begin at 8:00am off the first and 10^th tees Sunday morning. For more information on the championship or the Legends Junior Tour, please visit www.TXGA.org.

​For full first round results, click here.