Amari Avery wasn’t afraid. The moment didn’t feel too big for her.
It didn’t matter that she was just a freshman, or that she’d never played in a Curtis Cup. She didn’t flinch at the daunting setup at Merion East.
Instead, she tore it apart.
For two days at the 2022 Curtis Cup, Amari hit booming drives, towering irons, and rolled in almost every important putt. When her opponents chose conservative targets, Amari doubled down and got aggressive.
“I don't see a point in being too calm,” she told reporters, when asked if her style of play could hold up. “I think you might as well get turnt.”
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The Curtis Cup — a biennial competition featuring three days of match-play between amateurs from the United States and amateurs from Great Britain & Ireland — has always been a good window into who might emerge as a future star in the world of women’s golf. Amari had been semi-famous in golf circles since 2013, when she was featured as an 8-year-old prodigy in the Netflix documentary “The Short Game” but this felt like the culmination of something that had been building for years.
Her intimidating glare and her fluid, athletic swing was the buzz of the competition.
It felt like an arrival.
She was so good, the United States couldn’t take her out of the line-up. She went 4-0 over the first two days, and when Amari walked into the press tent at Merion on Saturday night, the prospect of a perfect Curtis Cup immediately came up. It was something only three players (Stacey Lewis, 2008; Bronte Law, 2016; Kristin Gillman, 2018) had accomplished. Was Amari about to be the fourth?
“You could not have dreamed this, right?” a media official asked.
A sense of eagerness and hope dawned on her.
“No, I could not have put it together like this,” Amari said.
Later that night, something about the chase for perfection began to haunt her. It wouldn’t go away. The United States had a commanding lead, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that she had to go 5-0. Someone brought it up minutes before she teed off for Sunday singles. It lingered. She was in the anchor spot in the line-up, teeing off last, in case the United States needed a hero late.
Matched up against GB&I’s Emily Price, who’d struggled to win anything all week, the thought of a sweep bothered her more than her opponent. She missed her lines. Her drives found the rough. Though the United States won the Curtis Cup long before her contributions mattered, Amari was the only player to lose a match all day, falling 4&3.
When the matches ended, there was an eruption of red, white and blue. It was one of the most decisive wins in the competition’s history, with the U.S. prevailing 15 ½ - 4 ½. As they gathered greenside, players hugged and high-fived. They draped one another in American flags. Amari participated and was elated for her teammates, but watching perfection slip through her fingers continued to eat away at her joy.
After several minutes, she could no longer fake a smile. She waited for a quiet moment to escape the noise and slipped into the Merion clubhouse.
Finally, alone, she dissolved into tears.
“I was heartbroken,” she said, reflecting a year later. “I wanted to make history. I'd been playing so well.”
At the Augusta National Women’s Amateur this week, Amari will be back in the spotlight once again. Her aggressive, athletic brand of golf will be put to the test as she tries to capture arguably the most coveted title in the women’s amateur game.
But Amari — now 20 years old — is no longer chasing perfection.
She had to learn to redraw the blueprint for her own success. Moving forward meant knowing and accepting that her best would need to be enough.
It just didn’t happen overnight. She needed time and space and independence.
She needed to discover the real Amari Avery.