Alessandra Liu won three tournaments this past fall and, in doing so, set or broke a number of William & Mary College records. (Photo courtesy of William & Mary Athletics)

Commonwealth National's Liu scorches collegiate circuit

  Alessandra Liu is taking the “go out in a blaze of glory” mantra to new heights. Winning golf tournaments and breaking records became routine for the William & Mary College senior this past fall.

  Liu, a Commonwealth National Golf Club member, captured the Nittany Lion Invitational, ECU Lady Pirate Intercollegiate and Pinehurst Challenge in a two-month span. She earned Colonial Athletic Association Women’s Golfer of the Week honors for the last two efforts, adding a third thanks to a runner-up performance in the William & Mary Invitational.

  “It’s been unreal. I keep getting better and better each month,” Liu, 22, of Bala Cynwyd, Pa., said. “I had a really good transition my Junior year. My game was starting to come around and I was shooting some pretty low scores. I came into this year wanting to maintain that. I kind of surprised myself when I won the first tournament.”

  The aforementioned transition is more mind than body.

  “I had a much better mental approach to my game. I was staying more in the present. I wasn’t thinking about the future,” Liu said. “This past semester, I started thinking about birdies. I was trying not to play scared. I came with a desire to win this year. When you win, you just want to keep winning.”

  An evolving mindset, in turn, sharpened other phases of Liu’s golf game.

  “My approach shots have really gotten better,” she said. “I’ve always been confident with my driver. In the past, my irons have been a little iffy. I’ve been hitting it pretty close this year. My putting has improved too. I’ve always been good about making the five to eight-foot birdie putts, but never the 10 to 20-foot birdie putts. Every putt has a chance to go in.”

  Liu continuously opened opportunities for victory throughout the fall thanks to her consistency. She also opened the William & Mary record books for revisions. In the Nittany Lion Invitational Sept. 5-6 at Penn State Golf Course in University Park, Pa., Liu started with a 3-under-par 69 — a collegiate career-best that, at the time, tied the Tribe record for lowest round. Her 36-hole score of 141 broke the previous Tribe record by two strokes. To top it off, Liu set a record for best 54-hole score with a 4-under-par 212. That total clipped the previous mark, set by Betsy Birchall in 2010-11, by five strokes.

  Liu tied one of her own marks a week later during the William & Mary Invitational at the Plantation Course at Kingsmill in Williamsburg, Va. She carded a 3-under-par 69 in the tournament’s second round. But that mark didn’t last long.

  During the Pinehurst Challenge Oct. 12-13 at Pinehurst No. 1 in Pinehurst, N.C., Liu fired a remarkable 7-under-par 65 in the second round, the best in the tournament’s 19-year history and the lowest collegiate score ever at Pinehurst. It is also the best score in Tribe history, trumping the previous mark by three strokes. Teammate Katie Edelblut, a Trenton Country Club member and the reigning Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia Amateur runner-up, opened the Pinehurst Challenge with a 4-under-par 68.

  “If anyone was going to beat it, I’m glad she did and I’m glad she went that low. It was incredible,” Edelblut, 19, of New Hope, Pa., said. “I had no idea that I had actually beaten the record. One of my teammates said, ‘Well you held the school record for five hours.’ I said, ‘Alex beat it, didn’t she?’ I’m very proud of her. It’s huge deal for anyone, especially at Pinehurst and especially for our team. It just goes to show how much work she’s put in and what we’re looking forward to in the spring."

  Pinehurst unearthed unprecedented treasures for Liu. She set Tribe records for best 36-hole score (8-under-par 136) and best 54-hole score (10-under-par 206). Liu is the first William & Mary player since Vickie Linkous in 1990-91 to win three times in a single season, and her four career medals rank her tied for fourth all-time with Tiffany Maurycy.

  Phew.

  “[Pinehurst] was a really cool experience,” Liu, a Kinesiology and Health Sciences major, said. “That was the hardest field for us. The course was set up in a way where the scores would be really low, so I knew I could shoot low. In the second round, everything was going pretty well. I was 7 under with four holes left. I knew I was way out of my comfort zone. I parred the last four holes, but they weren’t easy pars; they were four to six footers.”

  Liu, a Lower Merion High School graduate, is clearly in a comfort zone now. She currently ranks ninth in the country with a 70.75 average according to Golfstat.com, and is the only player in the Top 10 to log more than nine rounds. Her 43 birdies this season is also tied for the third-most in Division I.

  Overall, Liu holds 14 career rounds of par or better, another William & Mary record. Becoming a fixture within the Tribe annals is a “driving factor.” Liu feels inclined to spread that self-drive on and off the course.

  “I try to set a good example by going to all of the workouts and sending motivational texts before tournaments. I set up team hangouts,” she said.

  Liu started swing golf clubs at the age of 5, citing her parents Grant and Gerry as an influence.

  “I didn’t really like golf at first. I really liked ice hockey in middle school. It was my favorite sport,” Liu said. “My dad would always bribe me to play golf. Then I started to play in more competitive tournaments and liked the competitive environment: the pressure, waking up early, putting when the sun is just rising, the traveling.”

  Liu’s passion for golf magnified at William & Mary, specifically during her Junior year “when I started playing really well.” She was named CAA Women’s Golfer of the Week honors on three occasions and claimed her first collegiate victory at the Middleburg Bank Intercollegiate. Liu went on to qualify for her first U.S. Women’s Amateur last summer; she missed the match play cut.

  With a surging collegiate star comes the amateur or pro conundrum. You won’t see Liu stressing about the future.

  “It’s OK to not know what you want to do,” she said. “I’m just a college student. I have my whole life ahead of me. I don’t have to decide right now.”

Golf Association of Philadelphia
  Founded in 1897, the Golf Association of Philadelphia (GAP) is the oldest regional golf association in the United States and serves as the principal ruling body of amateur golf in its region. Its 151 Member Clubs and 57,000 individual members are spread across parts of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. As Philadelphia’s Most Trusted Source of Golf Information, the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s mission is to promote, preserve and protect the game of golf.