Senior division winner Debbie Durham, left, joins three-time Women’s City open champion Colette Murray in being honored Wednesday at Brainerd Golf Course. / CWGA photoUniversity of Tennessee at Chattanooga golf coach Colette Murray is 3-for-3 in winning the Chattanooga Women’s City Amateur championship, but the third time was different. She won from behind on the final day.
Murray made it a three-peat in the open division with a 71 Wednesday at Brainerd Golf Course, good for a 54-hole 213 and a three-stroke win over Samantha Griffith, the 2018 Lipscomb University graduate from Ooltewah who led after each of the first two rounds.
Griffith closed with a 77, as did Lindsey Hollis, last year’s overall runner-up to Murray (by six shots). Hollis, a Wofford recruit from Signal Mountain, finished third this time at 217. Macall Miller and Patty Donahoo also shot 77s and finished fourth and fifth in the championship flight at 233 and 234.
Lisa Lowery-Smith was the open first-flight winner at 240, and Meg Buchanan was second at 242 in a scorecard playoff with Sue Anne Tinker. Patty Jones won the second flight at 247 with a final 79, and Kim Smith at 253 and Katie Young at 258 were second and third.
There were 28 entrants in the senior division, which played two rounds, and Debbie Durham edged Carol Massey in a one-hole sudden-death playoff for the top spot in the first flight after each finished at 151. Darlene Werhnyak, the senior champion the previous two years, was third at 154 after a closing 74 – second only to Murray.