Stalvey advances to regionals of Drive, Chip and Putt competition

Parker Stalvey advanced to the national finals of the Drive, Chip and Putt competition two years ago, spending a Sunday in April at Augusta National Golf Club.

Younger sister Ella has the same goal, and took a step in that direction Saturday, qualifying for the DPC Regional in the girls 12-13 age group at Fort Jackson Golf Club.

Overall, 16 players, two from each of eight age groups, earned berths in regionals next Sunday at Pinehurst Country Club in Pinehurst, N.C. The division winners there move on to the nationals at Augusta National next April.

The Stalvey sisters “are fierce competitors on the golf course,” dad Ryan said. “Anything Parker has done, Ella wants to do better.”

Ella, an 11-year-old sixth-grader at Blythewood Middle, took up golf at age 5, quit for a while, then renewed her interest in the game more than a year ago. She checked a book by Annika Sorenstam out of the library, read it from cover to cover and puts the all-time great’s theories into practice.

“I want to break her records,” Ella said.

Superstitious, Ella is distinctive in all-white amid the rainbow of colors on the golf course. She plays with a yellow ball for a good reason; sister Parker plays with a pink one.

Ella, whose best 9-hole round is a 38 from the women’s tees at Cobblestone Park, will begin playing in tournaments in a couple of weeks, but first there’s the trip to Pinehurst on the calendar.

She earned that by tying Emma Schimpf (Daniel Island) with 116 points in the girls’ 12-13 division, and Ella won the tiebreaker. Schimpf had a slight edge in driving and chipping, but Stalvey made up the difference in putting. Both advanced to Pinehurst.

Mary Kathryn Talledo (Blythewood) “had a lot of fun” Saturday, and no wonder. She captured a spot in Pinehurst in the girls 14-15 age group, finishing second to Abigail Schimpf (Daniel Island) in a neck-and-neck competition. Schimpf scored 70 of a possible 75 points to offset Talledo’s excellence in chipping to win the division 134-132.

Talledo is an eighth-grader home-schooled at Connections Academy who has been playing golf for four years. She plays at Columbia Country Club and said, “I’m looking forward to next week. It’s going to be fun.”

More than 140 youngsters competed Saturday in the program sponsored by the PGA of America, the United States Golf Association and Augusta National Golf Club.

“If this is any indicator, the future of golf is bright,” said Tom Mason, owner of Pat Tee Golf Center in West Columbia and one of the foremost boosters of junior golf. “We had more than 200 (in local qualifying) at our facility, so there’s a lot of interest in the game by young people.”