Submitted photo / USGA. Warren-native Gianna Clemente hits her drive to kick off her match against Yana Wilson during the championship match of the 2022 U.S. Girls’ Junior at The Club at Olde Stone in Bowling Green, Ky. on Saturday.

Gianna Clemente prides herself on her ball striking — so much so that it carried her all the way to the championship match of the U.S. Girls’ Junior Championships this past week at Olde Stone in Bowling Green, Ky.

Despite a dynamic run through a grueling, deep tournament field, the 14-year-old Warren native came up short Saturday, falling in the final match 3-and-2 to 15-year-old Yana Wilson, of Nevada, to finish as the tournament runner up.

“My ball striking in most of my matches was really good — I don’t remember which match it was, but I don’t think I missed a single green in one of my matches,” Clemente said. “Then on the last day, towards the end, it didn’t fall apart, but I just couldn’t really get anything going. I felt like I was playing solid most of the week and then on that last day just lost my momentum a little bit and lost my ball striking a little bit and couldn’t get the putts to fall.”

The tournament opened with two rounds of stroke play, where Clemente opened with a 2-under 71 and closed with an even-par 73 to finish 2-under overall and tied for 14th in the field.

That earned her the No. 16 seed in the 64-player match play tournament field.

“It’s definitely different — the majority of the tournaments that I play are stroke play, and I don’t have all the match play experience in the world, but I’ve played a couple match play tournaments in my day,” Clemente said. “So you just have to take it hole-by-hole and shot-by-shot. It’s obviously different because you’re not playing a whole field of players, you’re just playing one person. So you really have to focus on each shot and just go from there.”

Clemente’s first, second and Round of 16 matches each had similar outcomes. In each match, she faced early deficits on the front-nine and came back with strong showings on the back-nine to finish off matches.

In the first round, she went down 2-down and ended up defeating No. 49 seed Jessica Guiser 3-and-2. Clemente’s largest deficit came in the second round, where she came back from being 4-down to defeat No. 17 seed Adrian Anderson 2-up after winning six of the final eight holes.

Then in the Round of 16, Clemente again came back from 2-down to beat No. 32 seed Kiara Romero 2-and-1. In the quarterfinals, she jumped out to an early 2-up lead, but her opponent, Justice Bosio, brought things back even before Clemente was able to finish off the match 2-and-1.

Clemente was at her best in the semifinals. She made a whopping eight birdies over the course of 13 holes to knock off No. 12 seed Maria Jose Marin, of Colombia, 6-and-5.

In the final against Wilson, both players had to deal with playing 36 holes in oppressive heat and humidity.

“It was definitely really tough,” Clemente said. “I think fatigue was definitely a huge factor. I tried everything to make sure it didn’t affect my play.”

They played 18 holes in the morning, during which Wilson took a 1-up lead, but throughout the morning and for the first half of the afternoon round, the two players largely went back and forth with the lead. Neither player could go more than 1-up against the other. Clemente had the lead seven times during that stretch, while Wilson had it six times.

It all changed on the back-nine of the afternoon round. Clemente had a 1-up lead heading to the 27th hole, but Wilson closed by winning four of the final eight holes to clinch the match and the championship 3-and-2.

“I think it was partially fatigue,” Clemente said. “We were both pretty tired and it was a really long week, especially coming from tournaments the week before. It was exhausting but you just have to fight through it, there’s nothing you can do but finish.”

“Honestly the last nine holes I wasn’t hitting it my best. I missed a couple greens that I normally wouldn’t miss and I do think the fatigue was definitely a factor towards the end, but Yana definitely capitalized on those holes that I wasn’t playing too well and that just happens in golf.”

Clemente’s runner up finish earns her an exemption into next month’s U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship at Chambers Bay in Washington. She previously earned a spot in the history books as the third youngest player to ever qualify for a U.S. Women’s Amateur in 2019 at Old Waverly when she was 11.

“I actually went and tried to qualify and didn’t qualify for the amateur,” Clemente said. “Then I got the exemption through my finish [last week], so I’m super excited for that and I’m going to move on from this and just go work hard for the next one.”

nmadhavan@tribtoday.com