Around the Green

Kim’s Eagle on 18 Propels Him to Lead at Lanny Wadkins Junior Championship

PROSPER, Texas – Frisco’s Samuel Kim dropped a 40-foot eagle putt on the 18^th hole Monday afternoon to card a first-round 4-under 68 at the Lanny Wadkins Junior Championship at Gentle Creek Country Club. He leads a crowded leaderboard where 22 players are at even-par or better after the first round.

Houston’s Zoe Slaughter leads the Girls 12-18 Division after shooting 4-under-par 68, while Carrollton’s Greg Seo leads the Boys 14 & Under division after a first round 4-over-par 76.

Gentle Creek Country Club is hosting the Lanny Wadkins Junior Championship for the fifth consecutive year. The D.A. Weibring designed golf course winds through the new residential neighborhoods of Prosper. The Boys 15-18 division is playing the golf course at 7,044 yards, while the Boys 14 & Under division is playing 6,496 yards and all girls are playing 5,948 yards.

Kim hit his drive into the fairway bunker on the 541-yard, par-5 finishing hole. He waited for the green to clear, then hit what he thought was a shot that was going long, carrying the water in front and the green.  He yelled at it to ‘sit down’ before it finally settled on the back portion on the green, approximately 40 feet from the hole.

Kim drained the eagle putt as fellow competitors and spectators cheered on behind the green. Kim’s putt propelled him to a 4-under-par 68 in the first round of the Lanny Wadkins Junior Championship at Gentle Creek Country Club in Prosper.

“It was the only putt I really made all day,” Kim said following his final stroke of the day. “I missed several birdie putts out there today.”

He made a few more putts than that eagle putt on the 18^th, carding four birdies in his round and he sits atop a crowded leaderboard heading into Tuesday’s final round. Austin Reily, Christian Hansen, Matthew Denton, and Jackson Tuthill all carded 3-under 69’s and sit one shot back of Kim.

Henry Frizzell, Randall Heck, Colton Hilburn, Drake Davidson, and Junwoo Park shot 2-under-par 70 in the opening round and sit tied for sixth place.

Slaughter matched the low round of the day at Gentle Creek Country Club and leads the Girls 12-18 Division at 4-under overall. Slaughter’s 68 consisted of six birdies on Monday with the last one coming on No. 17 after she sank a 30-foot putt on 380-yard par 4.

Trailing Slaughter in the Division is Halle Whitney of Magnolia. Whitney shot 1-under 71 in the first round with birdies in two of her last three holes. Kingwood’s Elise Parel and McKinney’s Madigan Murray are tied for third in the division at even-par 72, while Allen’s Taylor Mieras rounds out the top five at 2-over.

In the Boys 14 & Under division, Seo birdied the difficult par-3 ninth hole. He leads by five shots over McKinney’s Evan Kugle. Jake Bendetti, also of McKinney, is in third place heading into Tuesday’s final round at Gentle Creek CC.

Final round tee times are scheduled to begin at 7:30 AM off the first tee Tuesday morning. For more information on the Legends

Junior Tour, please visit www.TXGA.org.

For full first round results, click here.