Field Announced for 2008 Heritage Junior Championship

Event will be held at Berkeley Hall, June 16-19 

BRASELTON, Ga. – The American Junior Golf Association has set the field for the Heritage Junior Championship, June 16-19, 2008. The 54-hole stroke play event will take place at Berkeley Hall in Bluffton, S.C. The 78-player field will feature boys and girls, ages 12-18, from 18 states and Canada.

This year, three local players will be looking to keep the trophy close to home. Jason Fick and Rachel Uremovich, both of Hilton Head, S.C., will be participating in the Heritage Junior Championship. Fick will compete is his first ever AJGA tournament. Uremovich, playing her first tournament of the season, will return to the Heritage Junior Championship for her second year in a row. Returning to his grandparents’ hometown, Ross Frankenberg, of Barrington, Ill., has close ties to the Berkeley Hall course. Participating in his second event of the 2008 season, Frankenberg will look to take home the trophy from the course where his grandfather, Bob Frankenberg, is a member.

Headlining the Boys Division is Nicholas Austin of Midlothian, Va., followed by Joseph Byun of Sanford, Fla. Coming off a strong year, Austin will play his third event of the season. In 2007, he earned four top-five finishes, including a second place finish at the Junior All-Star at Toftrees. Byun will return to the Heritage Junior Championship for the second year in a row. Byun placed in the top 15 in three events last year, including a seventh place finish at the 2007 Birks & Mayors Junior Championship at Mirasol.

Casey Ann Kennedy of Venice, Fla., is the highest ranked player in the Girls Division, with a current Polo Golf Ranking of 58. Kennedy has earned top 10 finishes in all seven of her career AJGA tournaments. She took first at the AJGA Rhode Island Classic in 2007 and most recently tied for seventh place at the AJGA Cliffs Championship in April. She will be joined by Courtney Gunter of Matthews, N.C., also a top player in the field. Gunter finished first at the Golf Pride Junior Classic in 2007 and claimed three other top-10 finishes last year. She will be playing in her third tournament of the 2008 season.

Prior to the tournament, an AJGA Qualifier will be held on Sunday, June 15 at 8:30 a.m. The event, held at the Berkeley Hall Golf Club, will help round out the tournament field and allow less experienced juniors to “play their way in” to the Heritage Junior Championship.

The tournament will begin with a Junior-Am Fundraising Tournament on Monday, June 16 with an 8:30 a.m. shotgun start. An official practice round will follow at 2 p.m. The tournament tee times will run from 7:30-9:27 a.m. off of Berkeley Hall’s first and 10th tees Tuesday, June 17 through Thursday, June 19. An awards ceremony will immediately follow play Thursday, June 19.

The American Junior Golf Association is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to the overall growth and development of young men and women who aspire to earn college golf scholarships through competitive junior golf. The AJGA, the largest Association of its kind, has an annual junior membership (boys and girls ages 12-18) of approximately 5,000 junior golfers from 49 states and 30 foreign countries.

Titleist, the AJGA’s National Sponsor, has been the catalyst and driving force behind the Association’s success since 1989. Rolex Watch USA, which is in its third decade of AJGA support, became the inaugural AJGA Premier Partner in 2004. In 2007, after 12 years of support, Polo Ralph Lauren became the AJGA’s second Premier Partner.

AJGA alumni have risen to the top of amateur, collegiate and professional golf. More than 160 former AJGA juniors currently play on the PGA and LPGA Tours and have compiled more than 300 wins. AJGA alumni include Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Jim Furyk, Stewart Cink, Davis Love III, Cristie Kerr, Pat Hurst, Paula Creamer, Brittany Lincicome, Morgan Pressel and Julieta Granada.

For more information, please contact Sara Wagoner ( This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ) in the AJGA Communications Department at (678) 425-1790, or visit the AJGA Web site at ajga.org.
 
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Boys Division

 
Girls Division