Walking off the 18th green Wednesday afternoon, Palisades High golfer Anna Song was greeted by her coach Dave Suarez, who offered her a choice of a brownie or a cookie. She did not hesitate to choose the latter — a sweet reward for her seven-under-par 65 that set a City Section finals scoring record and earned her a third straight individual championship at Balboa Golf Course in Encino.
“I’m a cookie person, always and forever,” said the Stanford-bound senior, who joined Tiffany Yau of Van Nuys as the only girls in section history to win three individual titles. “I honestly didn’t know about the record. When you’re out there playing you’re not thinking about that.”
Song bettered the previous record of 67, which she carded as a sophomore at Balboa to win her first individual title after finishing second behind teammate Chloe Rahn as a freshman. Last year, she fired a bogey-free round of 68 to repeat as champion. On Thursday, she adjusted to gusty winds and fast greens to make five straight birdies from holes 8-12 and pull away from the field. She won by 10 shots over Mia Siegel of Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies, the second largest margin ever in City history behind Yau’s 11-stroke win in 2011.
After parring the first hole, Song bogeyed the second and birdied the third, but found herself down three shots to Cleveland’s Momoka Takahashi, who birdied the first three holes. However, Song had eight pars and seven birdies over the last 15 holes.
She missed three short birdie putts on the back nine. Following her sizzling start, Takahashi had only one more birdie the rest of the way and finished third with a four-over-par 76.
“It took me a couple of holes to get used to the wind,” said Song, whose best score at Balboa was nine-under in a league match last year. “Every shot I had to take into account if I was playing with or against the wind. I left a couple of putts out there today, but overall I did pretty well. I like this course and I’ve played it a lot… it’s flat, there aren’t any tricks. It’s great to win, but it’s sort of bittersweet because this is my last one.”
Palisades captured its fourth consecutive team title with a score of 426 and advanced to the SoCal Regionals at Los Serranos in Chino Hills on Nov. 14. Granada Hills finished second, 63 strokes behind, and Cleveland was third. Song was on the Team USA Junior Solheim Cup team in September and was the runner-up at the CIF state finals last year at Poppy Hills Golf Course in Pebble Beach.
Southern Section individual tournament
Santa Margarita freshman Sam Daniels shot a 64 to win the CIF-SS individual finals in Temecula. Orange Lutheran junior Jude Lee was second with a 68. Oak Park sophomore Nina Xu, Marlborough senior Kaila Elsayegh, Sage Hill senior Alisa Ching and Irvine University freshman Gabriella Gu each shot a 69.