Ally Ewing, Cheyenne Knight and Angel Yin are the final players added to the US side. Already guaranteed spots are Zhang, Lilia Vu, Nelly Korda, Allisen Corpuz, Megan Khang, Jennifer Kupcho, Danielle Kang, Lexi Thompson and Andrea Lee, who claimed the last automatic spot with a 13th-place finish last year. week of the CPKC Women’s Open in Vancouver, BC
The announcement came less than 12 hours after Khang, making her fourth appearance at the Solheim Cup, collected the first victory of her LPGA Tour career by outlasting former world No. 1 Jin Young Ko in the first playoff hole of the CPKC Women’s Open. The event is the last chance for US players to earn qualifying points.
The top seven players in the US Solheim Cup points standings earn automatic bids, as do the two highest-ranked players in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings who would otherwise be ineligible. Lewis then selected the final three members for this year’s competition at Finca Cortesin in southern Spain, Sept. 22 to 24.
“Easy,” Lewis said when asked about the stress level of making his choices. “And a lot of it I think is probably more the stats and more the preparation that we did before this week, because [the players] I don’t know about this, but I’ve been wearing them for a few weeks now. I thought I had to make a decision yesterday, but Andrea took care of that for me.”
The US roster includes five Solheim Cup rookies, but two of the newcomers are reigning major champions. Vu, ranked No. 1 in the world, won the Chevron Championship, the first major on the LPGA Tour schedule, surpassing Yin in a playoff. She also won the Women’s British Open this year. Corpuz won her first major at this year’s US Women’s Open at Pebble Beach Golf Links.
Zhang, meanwhile, became the first player in 72 years to win on the LPGA Tour in her professional debut, defeating Kupcho in a playoff at the Mizuho Americas Open at Liberty National in Jersey City. The victory came less than two weeks after Zhang turned professional on the heels of Stanford’s second straight NCAA individual title.
He qualified for the Solheim Cup by the world rankingswhere he is ranked 31st.
“I didn’t think it was a possibility,” Zhang said. “I came to Mizuho just wanting to cut and finish my sponsor’s exemptions for the summer before going back to school in the fall, so it wasn’t really on the radar, but now that I’ve got that chance to play for to Stacy and to play for Team USA and to be on this team is definitely a dream come true.
The most experienced player for the Americans so far is Thompson, who is making his sixth appearance, although his struggles this season put him in danger of losing his tour card. The major champion and 11-time winner on the LPGA Tour ranks 157th in the CME Race to the Globe points list. The top 100 safe perfect conditions for next season.
Lewis indicated that perhaps Thompson’s most important contributions were behind the scenes and in the locker room. Thompson qualified for the team based on his world ranking of 21. He has a ranking as high as No. 6.
“There are some concerns about his game, 100 percent,” Lewis said. “However, talking to him, he handled it all very well. I’ve said it before, but you see him out on the golf course, and you’d never know he was struggling like he is right now.
The Americans lost the 2021 Solheim Cup, 15-13, at Inverness in Toledo, and in 2019 at Gleneagles in Scotland in heartbreaking fashion when Norway’s Suzann Pettersen sank a putt on the final hole in the final match to give Europe won 14½-13½.
Petterson is the European captain this year and finalized his team a week ago, consisting of Celine Boutier (France), Carlota Ciganda (Spain), Gemma Dryburgh (Scotland), Linn Grant (Sweden), Georgia Hall ( England), Caroline Hedwall (Sweden), Charley Hull (England), Leona Maguire (Ireland), Anna Nordqvist (Sweden), Emily Kristine Pedersen (Denmark), Madelene Sagstrom (Sweden) and Maja Stark (Sweden).
The Solheim Cup is usually contested every two years but will again be played in 2024 at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Gainesville, Va., marking the first major women’s professional event at the prestigious venue outside the nation’s capital. . The Solheim Cup Committee’s decision to move women’s golf’s most prestigious team event to even years follows the announcement that the Ryder Cup will be played in odd years after the 2020 edition was post amid the coronavirus pandemic.