2008 TN Women's Player of the Year
Points Standings
As of 09/03/08

By Dori Webb

Director of Women’s Competitions    

Tennessee Golf Association

Each year our office receives several calls regarding our points system.  This system is what our association calls the "Player of the Year" (POTY).  For women there are several different events that points dictate other than the Tennessee Women's Amateur and Senior Women's Amateur Player's of the Year.

Local, regional, and national competitions have different factors that determine just how points are awarded.  National competitions such as a USGA championship (i.e. - U.S. Women’s Amateur, U.S. Women’s Open, U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur) are at the top.  For women or young ladies in our country if you were to be the champion of a USGA championship you have achieved the highest status for a female amateur golfer, and if you are a Tennessee resident you can almost count on being the POTY.  So by starting here you can see how all other events relate to this level of competition.  This is the standard by which most all state and regional golf associations base their points systems from.  The next level would be of course our state golf championships.  Being the United States Women’s Amateur Champion is the ultimate achievement in women’s amateur golf, being crowned the Tennessee Women’s Amateur Champion is of the same comparison on the state level.  Tennessee’s amateur championship is match play (as are most USGA championships) and therefore the allotment of points is cumulative.  By that I mean you can obtain points by being the stroke play medallist, by qualifying for the championship flight, for each match you win, and then the most points awarded for being the overall champion.  Other competitions such as the Tennessee Women’s Open, which is a stroke play championship, awards points for the low amateur and the 2^nd – 10^th places.  The Women’s Four Ball Tournament only awards 15 points to both players on the winning team.  The reason for this is because being a team four ball event the teams overall score may be determined by the score of one player or the other and therefore it would not be fair to award points to a player whose partner carried the weight for the team.

Not to be left out are other national and regional golf championships that have a past champions list you are sure to recognize.  In 1976 a young amateur named Nancy Lopez won the Women’s Trans National Amateur Championship.  In 1955 Mrs. Scott L. Probasco Jr. won the Women’s Southern Amateur Championship.  This is Tennessee’s own Betty Probasco of Chattanooga, Tennessee Golf Hall of Fame inductee and the lady that our Tennessee Women’s Amateur Championship trophy is named after.  For these reasons and many more the Tennessee Golf Association must include them in our POTY points system as well as include them in other points system that are in place to determine who represents our state each year in the Southeastern Women’s Amateur Team Championship and every other year in the USGA Women’s State Team Championship. 

The Southeastern Women’s Amateur Team Championship (SWATC) and the USGA State Team Championship are two unique team competitions.  SWATC host 5 states, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Tennessee, in a team competition where nine ladies from each of these five states compete in a Ryder Cup style format over three days.  This event takes place each year and rotates host sites between each of the five states.  In 2006, Team Tennessee was victorious on our home turf, as the championship was hosted at Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club in Hendersonville, TN. 

The USGA Women’s State Team Championship takes place every other year and this year, 2007, the championship will take place at The Club at Carlton Woods in The Woodlands, Texas.  This prestigious championship holds court to teams from each of the 50 states, as well as Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia.  The teams consist of three players that compete in 54 holes of stroke play with the two best scores counting each day.  The men also participate in their own respective USGA State Championship.  In 2003 our men’s state team, Team Tennessee, won this championship for the first time.