Now its the boy’s turn at US Junior Amateur Championship
New Zealand’s Cooper Moore during his impressive Asia Pacific Amateur debut – image APAC
With the US Junior Girls Championship in Atlanta now over and the Gold Coast’s Shyla Singh having made it to the quarter finals before being eliminated, the US Junior Amateur for Boys begins today in Dallas in Texas.
The field is made up of 264 players ranging from age 13 to 18, only three of whom are Australasians.
New Zealand’s Cooper Moore, who earlier this year won both the New Zealand Amateur and Australian Junior titles, his fellow New Zealander Ryan Xie and Australian Arrow Aarov Shah provide a very minimal representation from our part of the world as they look to make the top 64 who will advance to the match play phase after 36 holes of qualifying.
Moore, from Christchurch, is clearly the standout given his success in the aforementioned events and at the Asia Pacific Junior Championships in Hong Kong and by being the leading Australasian at the Asia Pacific Amateur Championship last October.
Xie is from Auckland and at the age of just 14 earned a start at the 2023 New Zealand Open via final qualifying. In 2004 he won the Under 16 Jack Newton Classic and the New Zealand Under 16 Boys Championship.
18 year old Shah of Indian origin, but more recently based in Melbourne and in high school in the US, has signed to join the University of Southern California in the new semester, but earlier this year won the Dustin Johnson Junior Championship at Myrtle Beach.
Both Xie and Shah led the qualifiers for this week’s event three weeks ago.
