The LPGA Tour’s best are set to compete in the first edition of the Maybank Championship this week at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club. The field in Malaysia boasts 18 2023 LPGA Tour winners, as well as nine rookies and six of the top 10 in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings. A $3 million purse featuring a $450,000 winner’s check is up for grabs, as are points in the Race to the CME Globe, Rolex Player of the Year and Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year standings, with some players working to take home season-long awards while others try to secure their status for the 2024 season. Here’s a look at just a few of the featured groups this week at the Maybank Championship.
Thursday, 8:47 a.m. – Natasha Andrea Oon/Lydia Ko/Hannah Green
Group 15 on Thursday will see major champions Hannah Green and Lydia Ko tee it up alongside 2024 LPGA Tour rookie and Malaysia native Natasha Andrea Oon at 8:47 a.m. Oon just locked in status for next season via the Epson Tour’s Race for the Card, clinching her LPGA Tour card following her three-shot victory at the Murphy USA El Dorado Shootout in late September. In addition to her win, the 22-year-old recorded seven additional top-10 finishes this season on the Epson Tour, four of which were runner-up results, and earned Gaelle Truet Rookie of the Year honors after finishing second on the official money list with $149,670 in season earnings. This week at the Maybank Championship marks Oon’s seventh career start on the LPGA Tour and first since the 2022 Portland Classic. Two of those starts were in Malaysia in 2016 and 2017, limited-field tournaments that saw Oon receive sponsor invites as an amateur, and she has made just one cut in a regular-season, full-field event on the LPGA Tour, finishing in a tie for 49th at the 2022 Dana Open at Highland Meadows Golf Club. Oon will once again compete as a sponsor invitation at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club, this time as both a professional and a 2023 Epson Tour graduate who will be playing on the biggest stage in women’s golf starting next year.
Nineteen-time LPGA Tour winner Lydia Ko finally found some form last week at the BMW Ladies Championship, carding all four rounds in the 60s en route to a solo third finish at Seowon Valley Country Club. It was just her second top-10 result of the 2023 LPGA Tour season and first since a tie for sixth at the Honda LPGA Thailand in her first start of the year. Unfortunately, the 26-year-old was playing as a sponsor invite in last week's no-cut event, meaning Ko was not awarded any Race to the CME Globe points for her season-best third-place finish. She is doing the same again this week at the Maybank Championship as she works to pick up her 20th career LPGA Tour title, a win that would guarantee her those coveted 500 points that are now incredibly critical with only one regular-season event left on Ko’s 2023 schedule. She currently sits at 101st in the season-long Race to the CME Globe, 41 spots outside the top-60 cutoff for the CME Group Tour Championship, an event that Ko won last season. If she wants a chance to defend at Tiburón Golf Club, the New Zealand native is going to have to make some hay quickly as time is running out for the two-time major champion.
Australian Hannah Green has had a solid 2023 LPGA Tour season, capturing her third career victory and first since the 2019 Portland Classic in April at the JM Eagle LA Championship presented by Plastpro, defeating Aditi Ashok and Xiyu Lin in a playoff at Wilshire Country Club. The 26-year-old has recorded two other top-10 results this year, tying for fourth at the CPKC Women’s Open in August and finishing solo seventh at the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G in September. She also has earned one additional top-15 finish, tying for 13th at the U.S. Women’s Open at Pebble Beach Golf Links with a four-day total of 4-over. The Aussie is currently ranked 24th in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings and is 27th in the Race to the CME Globe, well inside the top 60 players who will qualify for the final event of the season in Naples, Fla. Green also had the opportunity to represent Australia earlier this year at the Hanwha LIFEPLUS International Crown, helping lead the Aussie squad to the final match, where they ultimately lost to the Thailand team and earned silver for their country.
Thursday, 8:58 a.m. – Leona Maguire/Rose Zhang/Kelly Tan
Ireland’s Leona Maguire will be making her first LPGA Tour appearance since finishing in a tie for seventh at The Ascendant LPGA benefiting Volunteers of America earlier this month, form that she’ll look to rekindle this week in Malaysia. It’s been a solid season for the 28-year-old, who earned her second career LPGA Tour victory at the Meijer LPGA Classic for Simply Give in June, defeating Ariya Jutanugarn by two shots at Blythefield Country Club. She has also recorded six additional top-15 finishes this season, including a tie for 11th at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Baltusrol Golf Club and a third-place result at the Bank of Hope LPGA Match-Play presented by MGM Rewards. Statistically, Maguire ranks sixth in strokes gained around the green (+0.49), according to KPMG Performance Insights, and she is also 12th in putting average (29.23) and 13th in rounds under par (38). The Duke University alum was also a member of this year’s European Solheim Cup, playing a pivotal role in the eventual 14-14 tie with the Americans that helped the Euros secure the Cup for a third consecutive time at Finca Cortesin.
After getting off to a strong start with a victory at the Mizuho Americas Open in her first start as a professional and then finishing inside the top 10 in three consecutive major championships, 2023 rookie Rose Zhang has cooled off a bit late in her inaugural season on the LPGA Tour. The 20-year-old hasn’t found the top 10 since tying for ninth at The Amundi Evian Championship in July and comes to Malaysia off a T26 at the Buick LPGA Shanghai and a T34 at the BMW Ladies Championship these last two weeks. Zhang has only missed two cuts this season at the Dana Open and the Portland Classic, and she currently sits at 30th in the Race to the CME Globe and at 32nd in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings. Like Maguire, she also teed it up in the 18th edition of the Solheim Cup in Andalucia, Spain, earning a half-point for the U.S. Team in her debut in the biennial team event.
Hailing from Batu Pahat, Malaysia, Kelly Tan is serving as the de facto host this week in Kuala Lumpur for the inaugural playing of the Maybank Championship. The 10-year LPGA Tour veteran first joined the organization in 2014 and has earned four career top-10 finishes, one of which was a runner-up that came this season at the Dow Great Lakes Bay Invitational alongside her playing partner and good friend Matilda Castren. This week marks Tan’s 18th event of the 2023 LPGA Tour season, and in addition to that solo second result, the 29-year-old has missed 13 cuts and is currently ranked 102nd in the Race to the CME Globe point standings, two spots outside the top 100 which would allow her to maintain her current status in 2024. Tan is competing in Kuala Lumpur as a sponsor invite, meaning she will not be awarded Race to the CME Globe points unless she wins the Maybank Championship since it is a no-cut event, and will need a solid finish in her next scheduled start at The ANNIKA driven by Gainbridge at Pelican if she wants to have full playing privileges next season.
Thursday, 9:31 a.m. – Atthaya Thitikul/Celine Boutier/Ayaka Furue
All three competitors in group 23 on Thursday at the Maybank Championship finished in the top 10 last week at the BMW Ladies Championship. Atthaya Thitikul earned her 11th top-10 result and fifth top-five finish of the season at Seowon Valley Country Club, finishing in a tie for fifth after carding rounds of 70-71-66-69. The 20-year-old captured two LPGA Tour titles in her rookie campaign last year, winning the JTBC Classic presented by Barbasol and the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G, and it felt like 2023 was going to see more of the same from the Thailand native, making it a touch surprising she has yet to win this year. She finished in the top 10 in seven of her first nine starts this season, and after missing back-to-back cuts at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and U.S. Women’s Open, Thitikul regained her footing, finishing T9 or better in four of her last seven starts. Statistically, she is second on Tour this season in scoring average (69.95), second in rounds under par (46), fifth in greens in regulation (73.99%), fifth in strokes gained total (+1.83) and seventh in putts per green in regulation (1.76). Coming off a strong showing in the Republic of Korea last week, Thitikul will definitely be a player to watch at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club, one that could finally break through and capture her third career victory at the Maybank Championship.
Frenchwoman Celine Boutier is currently leading the Race to the CME Globe points standings with three wins and four additional top-10 finishes this season, including a tie for fifth at last week’s BMW Ladies Championship. The 29-year-old earned the first top 10 of her banner year at the Honda LPGA Thailand, where she finished in a tie for fourth, and Boutier then became the winningest French player in LPGA Tour history just a few weeks later when she defeated Georgia Hall in a playoff at the LPGA Drive On Championship at Superstition Mountain. She cooled off in late spring and early summer, finding the top 10 twice at the Bank of Hope LPGA Match-Play presented by MGM Rewards and Dow Great Lakes Bay Invitational before picking up her first major title at The Amundi Evian Championship in Evian-les-Bains, France, the first French player ever to win the event. Boutier carried that momentum with her to the FREED GROUP Women’s Scottish Open presented by Trust Golf, winning again at Dundonald Links to become the first player since Jin Young Ko to win in back-to-back starts on the LPGA Tour. She has played consistently since, finishing T16 or better in three of her last four starts on the LPGA Tour. According to KPMG Performance Insights, Boutier is ranked third in strokes gained around the green (+0.53) and sixth in strokes gained total (+1.76) so far this season.
It feels like we haven’t seen much of Ayaka Furue since she finished runner-up at the Bank of Hope LPGA Match-Play presented by MGM Rewards in May. But the Japan native has been present on the leaderboard all season, earning eight total top-10 finishes to sit at eighth in the Race to the CME Globe standings. She recorded her first top-10 result since tying for sixth at the U.S. Women’s Open at Pebble Beach Golf Links in July last week in the Republic of Korea, carding rounds of 64-75-71-67 to finish in a tie for 10th at Seowon Valley Country Club. The Rolex Rankings No. 22 is currently second on the LPGA Tour in rounds under par (46), third in driving accuracy (83.69%) and seventh in strokes gained putting (+1.00) ahead of this week at the Maybank Championship. Furue will be looking to track down her first LPGA Tour victory this week in Malaysia since winning the 2022 FREED GROUP Women’s Scottish Open presented by Trust Golf as a rookie last season.
For a full list of tee times, please click here. All times are local.
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