Ashley joins group of collegiate winners in the US
PETALING JAYA: Malaysia’s United States-based golfers continued to deliver spectacular outcomes in their chosen sport.
On Sunday, Ashley Lau (pic) became the third Malaysian to win a collegiate golf title on American soil this year when she finished as one of the three joint-winners at the Indiana Invitational.
Ashley, representing University of Michigan, fired a career-low four-under 68 to share top spot with her more illustrious rivals Emily Price of Kent State University and Valery Plata of Michigan State University on a four-under 212 total.
Price is the world No. 47 and reigning English Amateur champion while world No. 73 Plata of Colombia came in third at last year’s US Women’s Amateur Championship.
It was Ashley’s maiden title after 23 starts since 2018.
It was certainly a well-deserved victory for the 20-year-old Sarawakian as she had been knocking on the door with two top-10 finishes last month.
She came in seventh and sixth respectively at the Briar’s Creek Invitational and PING/ASU Invitational.
“I stuck with the mentality of one shot at a time,” said Ashley, who helped Malaysia win team silver at the 2019 Philippines SEA Games.
“I tried not to get too ahead of myself when I was playing good and it paid off. I hit the ball well and that gave me a lot of good birdie opportunities.”
Ashley’s brilliant individual display also helped University of Michigan finish fourth in the 16-team standings.
Ashley and her team will aim to make an impression next at the Big 10 Conference Championship in Ohio from April 23-25.
“I can’t wait to crush Big Tens with my teammates as we haven’t even scratched the surface of how good we can play,” said Ashley as quoted by the University of
Michigan website.
Before Ashley, Allycia Gan (Missouri Western State University) and Nur Syazani Amalia Shahzan of (Oakland University) had also done Malaysia proud with their breakthrough wins.
Allycia claimed the UCM Southern Invitational title in February while Nur Syazani won the Nevel Meade Collegiate championship last month.
Alyaa Abdulghany (University of Southern California) and Warda Amira Abdul Rawof (East Tennessee State University) also excelled by emerging runners-up at the Gold Rush in February and Kiawah Island Classic in March respectively.