A pair of 17-year-olds, Texan Savannah Barber and Alexa Saldana, from Mexico walked away with the 2021 USGA’s Women’s Four-Ball Championship contested at Maridoe Golf Club in Dallas. The winners defeated Jillian Bourdage a Red-Shirt Freshman at Ohio State and Casey Weidenfeld, who will a Freshman at Auburn University this fall.
For the Bourdage/Weidenfeld team, it was a tough loss. They also lost in the finals of the 2019 U.S. Women’s Four-Ball to Erica Shepherd and Megan Furtney, both who are both now members of Duke’s Women’s Golf Team.
Even more so for Bourdage, as this were her third USGA Championship loss, when in the finals. She finished runner-up to Lei Ye, who is now a star at Stanford, in the 2019 U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship.
Bourdage of said of the loss,
“Obviously it’s not the best feeling in the world, but that’s just what comes along with the game of golf. You’re either going to win, or you’re going to lose. I was trying to take each shot one at a time and keep my head in the game for as long as I could.”
Bourdage sat out the 2020-21 season for the Buckeyes as a red-shirt, but she was the 2019 Florida State Girls’ Junior Champion and also named Player of the Year. She has two AJGA victories on her resume and earned a spot in the 2020 U.S. Women’s Amateur.
