Rookie Lindblad Wins JM Eagle LA Championship for first LPGA Tour win
By Amy Rogers
LOS ANGELES - Hundreds of fans lined the first fairway at El Caballero Country Club to watch the tournament leaders tee off, eager to witness what promised to be a thrilling final-round at the JM Eagle LA Championship presented by Plastpro.
Sunday, Ingrid Lindblad came into the final day in a three-way tie at the top and quickly delivered on the drama with a birdie at her first hole of the day to immediately separate herself on a jam-packed leaderboard that had nearly a dozen players within five strokes of the lead.
Lindblad’s opening birdie set the tone for her round as she continued to separate herself from the field and led by as many as three strokes over the course of the final day. With a final round of four-under par, 68, the 25-year old rookie captured the JM Eagle LA Championship for her first victory on the LPGA Tour.
“You should never not expect it, right?” Lindblad said about getting her breakthrough win on Tour. “But obviously got it done in a couple starts; just kind of crazy.”
Lindblad’s victory comes in just her third start of her rookie season and she joins Rio Takeda as the second rookie to win this year on the LPGA Tour. Her win comes on the heels of a standout collegiate career in which she won 15 times, an SEC record, during her five-year stint at LSU. With her win on Sunday, Lindblad joins fellow Swede Annika Sorenstam as a winner at El Cab, where Sorenstam won in 2003 and 2004, which was the last time the LPGA Tour visited the venue in Los Angeles.
“It means a lot,” Lindblad said about joining her idol. “She's done a lot for us in women's golf and just she's a big inspiration.”
Lindblad held a share of the 54-hole lead with Lauren Coughlin and Akie Iwai at 17-under par and in the penultimate pairing alongside Ina Yoon, who quickly faded with an early double bogey. But Lindblad was unflappable. She appeared hyper-focused even before the round began. Sunday afternoon as she walked to the first tee a fan wished her good luck, but the well wishes never seemed to outwardly register with Lindblad who looked like she had on blinders as she took another bite of her apple and went straight to her work.
That’s not to say the day wasn’t without its challenges as Lindblad dropped shots at the third and sixth holes, but immediately bounced back with birdies. Throughout the day the rookie fought an unwieldy tee ball that found the waste area at the fifth and seventh holes where she delivered with creative recovery shots. Lindblad caught a fortunate break at the 13th hole when her wayward tee shot ricocheted back into the fairway and she managed to save par and maintain her two-stroke lead.
“I hit my driver. I had hit pretty good tee shots on that hole so felt pretty confident. Obviously I think the left miss is almost better than the right because it kicks down in the fairway,” Lindblad said about the wayward tee shot. “I don't know the camera guy up there, but he was like, there is a little squirrel up there who was nice to you and bumped it out on the fairway.”
Iwai was playing in the final group behind Lindblad and continued to keep pace with her fellow rookie. After Iwai made birdies at the 11th and 14th holes she was able to close within one stroke of Lindblad. And it was at the par five, 16th hole where Iwai cozied up her eagle attempt close enough to the hole to tap it in for birdie to join Lindblad in a tie at the top of the leaderboard. Once Lindblad closed with a par at the 18th hole to take the clubhouse lead at 21-under par the pressure was on Iwai to make a birdie for the win.
Iwai sent her approach to the 72nd hole long into the rough over the back of the green and rolled her chip well past the hole, which left her with a comeback putt that was too long for her to manage. Iwai suffered a closing bogey to card a final round, three-under par, 69 to record her second runner-up finish in four starts.
“Actually, it was a good experience because under the pressure, yeah, my ball goes right so I did notice that this week,” said Iwai about what she learned this week.
Sunday, several players took advantage of the ideal scoring conditions including Esther Henseleit, who came from six-strokes back on the final day with a bogey-free round of 64 to threaten the lead, but ultimately finished tied for third at 19-under par along with Miyu Yamashita and Lauren Coughlin.
Nasa Hataoka’s red-hot putter propelled her to the top of the leaderboard on Sunday, too. Hataoka began the final round 10-strokes back of the lead and made five consecutive birdies to close out her day and match the low round of the tournament. Hataoka finished tied for sixth at 18-under par.
Nelly Korda carded an Even par round of 72 to finish the day right where she started at 14-under par and finished the week tied for 16th.
JM Eagle and Plastpro contributed $1.5 mil to local relief efforts in the wake of the recent wildfires that ravaged the Los Angeles community and pledged an additional $5 mil donation. Hannah Green, the two-time defending champion at the JM Eagle LA Championship, also wanted to give back to the community where she’s had so much success and pledged to donate $500 for each birdie and $1000 for each eagle she carded during the JM Eagle LA Championship. Sunday, Green made a total donation of $10,500 to local fire relief efforts.
