College women tee off with Triad players on rosters

Several Triad women fill the rosters on NCAA Division I teams entering the fall season.

Macy Pate will start her junior year as the top returner at Wake Forest. She’ll be joined by former Reagan High teammate Morgan Ketchum, a three-year standout at Virginia Tech who will finish her career as a graduate student.

Pate has been chosen as a third-team preseason All-American by Golf Channel, which named Wake No. 12 in its preseason rankings. North Carolina was No. 15 in the rankings led by Stanford. Pate received ACC Freshman of the Year and has been All-ACC.

Ketchum won a tournament at Oklahoma last season and led the Hokies in scoring average as a freshman and as a sophomore.

Wake opens the fall season Sept. 8 at the Annaka Intercollegiate in Minnesota.

Anna Howerton, who played with Pate and Ketchum at Reagan, returns to High Point University as the Big South Conference Player of the Year in 2024-25. The junior won Big South Freshman of the Year in 203-24, when she was also All-Big South. Howerton has two collegiate victories. HPU opens Sept. 7 at the Golfweek Fall Challenge at Caledonia in Pawleys Island, South Carolina.

Leah Edwards got the nod for the No. 1 slot for Western Kentucky, which opened its season on Labor Day at the Boilermaker Classic at Purdue University. A freshman, Edwards won back-to-back Class 4A individual state high school titles for Northwest Guilford.

Macie Burcham, a regular member of the East Carolina lineup the past two seasons, returns for a redshirt senior year with the Pirates. The Wesleyan Christian graduate has won three Carolinas Golf Association Parent-Child tournaments with father Jeff Burcham.

Ellen Yu of Greensboro is a freshman on a UNC team that returns all five members of its starting lineup. A homeschooler, Yu won an AJGA tournament in 2022 at Carolina Trace in Sanford and won the 2019 U.S. Kids World Championship. The Tar Heels open Sept. 8 in Michigan at American Dunes Golf Club in the Folds of Honor Collegiate.

EC Niebauer, a grad student at Western Carolina, finished 31st in an 11-team field Aug. 26 at 7-over 149. Niebauer played at University of the South and Queens after graduating from High Point Central.

Katelyn Griggs, who played at Gray Stone Day in Lexington, is a senior at Gardner-Webb, which opens the season Sept. 15 in a tournament hosted by Elon.

Local teams wins CGA Mixed Team

Reece Hart of Winston-Salem and Joseph Cansler of Clemmons won the CGA Carolinas Mixed Team Championship on Aug. 17, in a three-hole playoff over Davis and Tina Morrison of Raleigh after both teams finished regulation play with a total score of 11-under 133 at Kiawah Island’s Oak Point course.