SAMMAMISH, Wash. — Leona Maguire is in familiar territory.
She has contended for major championship titles many times before, earning six top-15 results in those events alone since joining the LPGA Tour in 2020. Three of those finishes came in 2021, two came in 2022 and the most recent one came at last year’s KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Baltusrol Golf Club’s Lower Course.
And now, a year on from finishing in a tie for 11th in New Jersey, the Irishwoman is in the mix again at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and will continue searching for her first major victory this weekend at Sahalee Country Club.
Maguire has been steady through two rounds in Sammamish, Wash., opening her sixth appearance at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship with a 2-under 70 on Thursday. It was a round that saw her make two bogeys and four birdies, three of which came on par 4s.
The two-time LPGA Tour winner then followed that round up with a 1-under 71 on Friday in the Evergreen State, 18 holes of golf that were a bit rockier than her day-one effort. Maguire bogeyed her first hole of the round, stringing together six pars before finally cleaning up her mistake with a birdie on the par-4 8th hole.
Making the turn in level par and at 2-under for the tournament, the 29-year-old struck again with a birdie on the par-5 11th hole, ultimately handing that shot right back with a bogey on 12. She grabbed birdies on holes 14 and 16 to get to 4-under overall, erasing that effort with a double bogey on 17, a tricky downhill par 3 over water at Sahalee.
But never one to give up and quit, Maguire mustered up one last birdie on the closing par-5 18th hole to get back into red figures for the round and to sit in a tie for sixth at 3-under total with 36 holes to play at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship.
“The course is firming up a lot. It's dried out quite a bit, especially from yesterday morning, where it was still quite dewy when we played,” said Maguire. “Fairways are running a lot faster, and the greens are starting to firm up. That first bounce into the greens has got quite a bit bigger. So having to adjust to that on the fly. It was quite warm this afternoon as well, so the ball was traveling, so I hit quite a few more 3-woods off the tees today than I did yesterday.”
This is Maguire’s 13th start of the 2024 LPGA Tour season, and even though she has earned four top-15 results this year, the best of which was a runner-up showing at the T-Mobile Match Play presented by MGM Rewards in April, it’s been a quiet year for the Ireland native.
She comes to Sahalee off a T65 showing in her title defense at the Meijer LPGA Classic for Simply Give, and before that, she had missed the cut at both The Chevron Championship and the U.S. Women’s Open presented by Ally, also failing to make the weekend at the Mizuho Americas Open.
For a player who has captured a victory in her last two seasons on Tour, the stop-and-start momentum she has been dealing with this year has been somewhat frustrating for Maguire. However, the ever-competitive Irishwoman has really worked hard on giving herself some grace in the challenging moments and has tried to realize that bad stretches are going to happen when you’re playing arguably one of the hardest sports in the world.
“I probably have been very harsh on myself, I would say, lately. Probably too harsh,” Maguire shared on Thursday. “I've had people around me, family, people on my team going, you need to be kinder to yourself. I think that was the message this week. Not put too much pressure and expectations and embrace the challenge that (Sahalee) is going to bring like any other major.
“I suppose it's very tempting to try and be too perfect at a major knowing the consequences are higher if I miss a shot. To be kinder to myself this week was a big goal.”
That mindset seems to have worked well for Maguire so far as she currently sits within three shots of the 36-hole lead held by Sarah Schmelzel and Amy Yang. A three-shot deficit is almost nothing at a major championship venue like Sahalee, where one errant shot can cost you dearly, particularly if you find your ball shrouded in the cedar trees that smother the edges of the fairways.
And with a title still feeling well within reach even though she trails the co-leaders by a handful of shots in Washington, Maguire is as hungry as ever to finally track a major victory down this weekend at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, hoping to add major champion to her laundry list of already impressive achievements, something she has dreamt of for a long time.
“I think (Sahalee) is a balance between risk-reward,” explained Maguire. “You can be a bit more greedy off the tee to give yourself a shorter chance in, especially now that they're firming up. But at the same time, some of those necks and those fairways get really narrow with the overhang, and they're just narrow, period. So, it's getting that balance right of knowing when to attack and when to be smart about it.
“(I’ll hope to capitalize on) more of the same. Keep driving it in the fairways as much as possible. The greens got pretty bobbly this afternoon, so try and hole a few more putts. Always the key over a weekend at a major.”
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