Lauren Coughlin drained the winning putt, clinching a two-shot victory at the 2024 CPKC Women’s Open at Earl Grey Golf Club in Calgary.
Moments later, she drained a bottle of champagne.
“There wasn’t much left in it,” she protested.
Coughlin, who’d been soaked in a sudsy celebration, earned the right to savour every last drop.
The 31-year-old from Charlottesville, Va., is a first-time winner on the LPGA Tour. This was her 103rd career start. As she sized up the trophy, she listed off a few of her biggest supporters, describing them as “the people who believed in me from the very beginning who kept me going when I wanted to quit.”
“We’ve worked really hard just for this to happen,” said Coughlin, who signed for a four-round tab of 13-under 275. “And it’s better than I think I could have imagined.”
When the leaders arrived Sunday at No. 17, the hockey-themed ‘Rink Hole,’ it was looking like overtime … er, a playoff … may be necessary.
Coughlin, South Korea’s Haeran Ryu and Japan’s Mao Saigo were logjammed at the top of leaderboard, each sitting at 12-under.
And then Coughlin stuffed a six-iron close to a back pin and swished a delicate putt for birdie, while Ryu grimaced as her par attempt sailed wide. With Saigo about to make a bogey up ahead, Coughlin was suddenly two shots ahead with just one hole to play.
“At that point, my adrenaline was pumping,” Coughlin said. “My heart was racing pretty good. Just took as many deep breaths as I could.
“I was just trying to hit the fairway, hit the green, two-putt, get out of there.”
She did exactly that.
Saigo, after setting a tournament scoring record with Saturday’s spin of 61, ultimately finished in solo second at 11-under 277. Ryu and Jenny Shin, also of South Korea, split third at 10-under 278.
Coughlin, who was leading after both the first and second round and was just one stroke off the pace as she teed off Sunday, has talked all week about the importance of staying patient on a 6,856-yard layout that wasn’t yielding a lot of easy birdies.
She had to take her own advice as she waited for her flat-stick to warm up on the last lap. She credited her caddie Terry McNamara, the longtime looper for the legendary Annika Sorenstam, for helping her to stay positive.
“He just kept being like, ‘They’ll eventually go in, they’ll eventually go in,” Coughlin said. “Eventually it did on No. 17.”