With the Curtis Cup to get underway this Friday at Dun Laoghaire Golf Club, we take a closer look at the GB&I team looking to regain the transatlantic trophy.
Leona Maguire may only be 21 but her name is one long associated with golfing brilliance.
Rising to the top of the amateur ranks early alongside her twin sister Lisa, Maguire is preparing to tee up in her fourth Curtis Cup this Friday at Dun Laoghaire Golf Club. Having recently lost the world number one spot to Hannah O’Sullivan who will represent America in Ireland next week, Maguire will be hoping to reassert her dominance in front of a large home crowd this weekend.
Maguire, who hails from County Caven, was a cert to make the team as the top four ranked players in the World Amateur Golf Rankings (WAGR) and the top 2 in the LGU Order of Merit were automatic selections. She had an outstanding 2015 season as she reached number one in the WAGR in mid May 2015, won the 2015 Annika Award for the best golfer of the year in American college women’s golf and was selected as the 2015 WGCA (Women's Golf Coaches Association) Player of the Year and Freshman of the Year.
Amongst her best achievement’s last year was a second place finish in the European Ladies Masters at Buckinghamshire Golf Club. It was, she says, to road test her game against top players on the professional circuit. A 15-foot putt on the 18th that slipped right denied her a playoff with Californian professional Beth Allen but her performance demonstrated her outstanding ability.
Maguire's exploits stretch back way beyond her university years. She played in the 2010 and 2012 Curtis Cup matches and has also played for Europe in Junior Ryder Cup and Junior Solheim Cup matches against the United States. Won the Helen Holm Scottish women's stroke-play title in 2009, the year she made her debut for GB&I in the Vagliano Trophy match. In 2011 she won the Ladies British stroke play, the Irish women's open stroke play and the Portuguese women's open amateur championship.
2016 will be Maguire’s 4th consecutive time to make the Curtis Cup side, and with only one win for the GB&I side in 2012, she will be hoping to be part of another winning team this June on home turf at Dun Laoghaire.
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