Leigh Chien, the defending CIF girls state champion, picked up where she left off last November, capturing the CIF/SCGA SoCal Regional High School individual title today at Brookside GC to reserve her chance at a title defense next week at San Gabriel CC.
Although at this year’s state championship, the rest of the Santa Margarita HS team will join her. And that’s what excited her the most as she reflected on a round where she shot five-under 68 with zero bogeys.
“I’m really excited,” Chien, a Youth on Course/Golf Pass member said. “My whole team is going and last year it was just me so it will be a lot more fun…That means that when we go back to school the teacher will be more lenient on us too.”
In its first appearance as a team in the Southern Section championship, Santa Margarita HS dominated the team competition. Across its five-person team, the Eagles finished at four-over, led by the junior Chien, a Stanford commit.
“Very excited with the chemistry of these girls,” Head Coach Jill Hegna said. “We’re coming off a 14-0 season, they’ve just been on fire…This is the first time we’re here as a team, and then to win it, on top of that, this is very special.”
As for Chien, she established herself near the top of the leaderboard early on with two birdies on the scorecard through her first five holes. Staying consistent with pars, she found herself a couple strokes off the lead as she made the turn.
She eventually took sole possession of first place with a pair of birdies on her 15th and 16th holes. Though Vista Murrieta’s Lauren Sammon was charging up the leaderboard, putting together a string of five birdies in six holes to challenge Chien. The two became tied at four-under with two holes remaining.
On her 17th hole, Chien knocked in her fifth and most important birdie of the day to restore her solo lead, and it proved to the difference. Sammon parred, then bogeyed her final hole to fall out of individual title contention.
“I didn’t miss a lot of greens today, so it was easy for me to not make mistakes,” Chien said. “My putts were dropping in the end and that helped a lot.”
She’s got six days to prepare for her state title defense, confidence boosted by a stellar round at Brookside and a regional title to add to her resume.
“It feels good. I feel like I have more confidence going into states. I’m proud that I was able to pull it off today.”
Sammon (70) led the individual qualifiers for next week, which also includes Natrada Pongsasin (71) Mitzi Duarte (71), Kelsey Kim (72), Alyson Sor (72), Kiana Glossner (73), Yurang Li (73) and Cristen Legaspi (73) and Ashley Yun (74). Joining Santa Margarita on the team side will be Arcadia and Portola.
