0120주년 이정표 세운 LPGA 대표 인기 대회
미국여자프로골프(LPGA) 투어의 대표적 대회인 '월마트 NW 아칸소 챔피언십 프레젠티드 바이 P&G(Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G)'가 개최 20주년을 맞이했다.
글로벌 기업 월마트와 P&G의 파트너십을 바탕으로 성장해 온 이 대회는 지난 20년간 수많은 세계 정상급 선수들이 출전하며 LPGA 투어의 주요 일정으로 자리매김했다.
대회 측은 20주년을 기념하여 팬들과 지역 사회에 더 큰 즐거움을 선사하고, 대회의 역사와 전통을 기리는 다양한 행사를 준비하고 있다.
02Original (English) — LPGA
Amy Rogers is an award winning multimedia journalist and freelance writer who has covered professional golf since 2007. She is a contributor to LPGA.com in addition to the Golf Channel and BBC's coverage of the LPGA Tour.
Brooke Matthews has grown up with the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G. Matthews was just eight years old when her parents first opened up their home to two players on the LPGA Tour as a host family during the tournament week. Although Matthews was born and raised in the community that surrounds Pinnacle Country Club, the longtime home of the tour stop in Rogers, Arkansas, she wasn’t interested in golf. Matthews was obsessed with gymnastics. That was until the LPGA Tour played in her backyard.
Vicki Goetze-Ackerman and Wendy Ward were the two players who came to stay with Matthews and her family for the first time 20 years ago and she remembers going out to the tournament to watch them compete. Year after year Goetze-Ackerman would come and stay and Matthews would watch her and the other players during the tournament week. And as Matthews grew in her knowledge and love of the game, Stacy Lewis, a local student at the University of Arkansas who won the inaugural edition of the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship in 2007, quickly became a favorite that Matthews looked forward to watching each time the Tour came to her hometown. Soon enough, Matthews traded cartwheels and backflips for birdies and bogeys.
Matthews followed Lewis to the University of Arkansas and like her fellow Razorback, also got a chance to compete as an amateur in the LPGA Tour event in her own backyard for the first time in 2020. And Goetze-Ackerman became a constant connection as year after year she would stay with the Matthews’ family during the week of the tournament and she has followed her example in becoming a member of the LPGA Tour.
In what will certainly be a full-circle moment for the 27-year-old Matthews on Friday morning, the Rogers’ native will hit the opening tee shot in celebration of the 20th edition of the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G.
“I have a lot to credit it for, maybe the reason that I got into competitive golf,” Matthews said about the tournament’s influence on her life. “Being around the best female athletes in the world and having that as my first impression of the game, I set my goals really high. I have a lot to credit this event to, just how far I’ve come.”
Matthews represents what the LPGA Tour has long-hoped to achieve - to expose a younger generation to golf in the hopes that they, too, will take up the game.
That mission is particularly evident at the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G, which has become a pipeline for young players competing under the leadership of women’s golf coach Shauna Taylor at the University of Arkansas. Each year, the tournament awards two exemptions into the field for members of Taylor’s program, which has helped to cultivate LPGA Tour talents like Lewis, Matthews, Maria Fassi, and Gaby Lopez.
“This tournament has meant the beginning of my career, the beginning of dreaming big for sure,” Lopez said about the significance of the event throughout her career. “It means so much because I can feel all the good energy and the great vibes from the community. It's not only about the golf, but it's about the people that make it happen and the community that supports it. I think that's exactly why this tournament has so much success.”
The tournament’s location in the Razorbacks’ backyard is a major recruiting tool for Taylor’s program, and it was the tournament’s relationship with the school that sealed Maria Jose Marin’s interest in playing college golf at Arkansas. Marin visited the university during the week of the tournament and saw first-hand the value in not only attending, but also having the opportunity to compete in the tournament would help her grow as a person and as a player. Marin was awarded her first exemption into the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship in 2024.
“It has brought me a lot of experience on what to expect from the Tour, just to handle pressure. How to control myself on the course,” said Marin about the experience of competing in the tournament. “Growth personally, yeah, just made me a better player and always looking forward to playing in this event. Yeah, just like letting myself dream, dream big.”
The tournament’s 20th edition granted an exemption again to Marin, who was the winner in April of the Augusta National Women’s Amateur, and Reagan Zibilski. And if history is any indication, that gesture will no-doubt help to further foster their growth within the game of golf.
“It's been a homerun for us in recruiting,” Taylor said about her program’s partnership with the tournament. “It's a great little tip of our hat when we're talking about you want to play the Tour, we can help you do that.”
The Walmart NW Arkansas Championship hasn’t only nurtured local amateurs, but has continued to support players in their transition to the professional ranks by providing sponsor exemptions to Razorbacks who have graduated from the program, including Fassi, a recipient of one of this year’s sponsor exemptions who made her tournament debut while still a student in 2016.
“When I was in school it was the No. 1 player on the team would get the exemption into the event, so it started as a dream, as a goal of wanting to play here and learn from the best in the world,” Fassi said about the importance of playing in the tournament. “With the years, obviously now being this is year seven on the LPGA, it's changed a little bit, but there is still the dream of wanting to win this tournament one time.”
The significance of the tournament has evolved for Fassi in her years competing on the LPGA and Epson Tours but she still considers the Arkansas area her home and has continued to remain attached to the golf tournament through her foundation, Fassi’s Friends, which hosts special events including junior clinics during the tournament.
“With the foundation and with how much we do throughout the week. That has a huge piece of my heart,” Fassi said about her connection with the event. “Just every day of the week there is something awesome happening and something that I'm grateful for and something that we're being able to impact people and kids.”
Matthews felt that impact as a young girl, watching the best in the women's game compete in her hometown altered the direction of her life. This week, as Matthews makes her sixth appearance at the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship she’ll be staying with her parents in the same home where she grew up. And Goetz-Ackerman will be there too, as Player President of the LPGA Tour she continues to stay with the Matthews family whenever she’s in town.
With Matthews having grown into the role of local fan-favorite in Rogers, she has many more demands on her time than she has during a typical week on the LPGA Tour. But Matthews is happy to accommodate and make every effort she can to help spread the word about the hometown event that played such a formative role in shaping her life.
“It's a unique opportunity. Not very many people on Tour get to have a home game,” Matthews said about the week ahead. “A lot comes with it, but at the same time I embrace it and make it an opportunity for me to grow.”