First Published by By Joey Geske, USGA
The USGA has named top-ranked Americans Anna Davis, of Spring Valley, Calif., and Gordon Sargent, of Birmingham, Ala., as the first automatic selections to the 2023 USA World Amateur Teams. The 33rd men’s championship will take place Oct. 18-21, followed by the 30th women’s championship Oct. 25-28, at Abu Dhabi Golf Club (National Course) in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
Davis (No. 4 in WAGR) and Sargent (No. 1) have earned an exemption as the top Americans in each respective World Amateur Golf Ranking®/WAGR® as of June 21. The men’s team will be captained by Mark Newell, a USGA past president, and the women’s team by Courtney Myhrum, a member of the USGA Executive Committee.
Davis, 17, won the 2022 Augusta National Women’s Amateur and competed in seven LPGA Tour events later that year, including three majors, and made the cut five times. This year, Davis has victories at the Girls Junior Orange Bowl in Florida and the Junior Invitational at Sage Valley in South Carolina. She also competed in last week’s U.S. Women’s Open at Pebble Beach (Calif.) Golf Links. In 2021, she was named to both the U.S. Junior Solheim Cup and Junior Ryder Cup teams. Davis has committed to play collegiately at Auburn University.
Sargent, 20, earned low-amateur honors in last month’s U.S. Open at The Los Angeles Country Club with a T39 finish. He was also voted Southeastern Conference Player of the Year as a sophomore at Vanderbilt University in 2022-23. He posted eight top-5 finishes, including fifth in the SEC Championship and a tie for seventh in the NCAA Auburn Regional. Sargent won the 2022 NCAA individual title in a playoff and received the Phil Mickelson Award as the nation’s top freshman. He helped the USA win a bronze medal at last year’s World Amateur Team Championship in Paris, France.
The final automatic spots on the USA World Amateur Teams will be awarded to the winners of the 2023 U.S. Women’s Amateur and 2023 U.S. Amateur, as well as the McCormack Medal winners, if they are American.
Any final team selections and alternates for the WATC will be selected by the International Team Selection Working Group upon the conclusion of the U.S. Amateur.
The World Amateur Team Championships are a biennial international amateur golf competition conducted by the International Golf Federation, consisting of 72 holes of stroke play (18 holes a day over four days). In each round, the total of the two lowest scores by the three players from each team constitutes the team score for that round. The four-day total is the team’s score for the championship. Following a decision by the IGF Administrative Committee in 2020, the 2023 championships will be the first to be held in an odd-numbered year to avoid conflicting with the Summer Olympic Games. In 2022, Sweden won the Espirito Santo Trophy and Italy claimed its first Eisenhower Trophy.
