JM Eagle LA Championship (2025)
- Craig Thomson
- Apr 15
- 9 min read
It was a break last week for the LPGA after a pretty frantic T-Mobile Matchplay which saw Swedish star Madelene Sagström win her second title, defeating the always gutsy Lauren Coughlin in the final by 1up.
Event Info
This week the players head to Tarzana in California, just outside of Los Angeles, for the JM Eagle LA Championship which is in its third instalment. Hannah Green superbly won both times over at Wilshire Country Club. Wilshire CC this year is undergoing a course renovation so it will be played at El Caballero Country Club in Tarzana.
This Robert Trent Jones Snr designed course is pretty long at 6,679 yards and will require good iron play, good short game and accuracy with sloped greens, tight fairways and hilly complexes. I think this course will work both ways. It will reward good shot making, hitting the flat spots on the greens, but also a couple of bad bounces and there will be trouble that could be looking at bogeys and doubles. It seems a fair test. Long drivers should have advantage but I will focus more on the irons and strategy play.
One last thing to note is that typically you would associate California with Poa Annua and that was certainly the case at Wilshire CC but it will change this week with BermudaGrass in order at El Caballero.
Event History
2024: Hannah Green (-12) by 3 shots to Maja Stark
2023: Hannah Green (-9) by P/Off to Xiyu Lin & Aditi Ashok
2024 LA Championship Top 20 & ties
1) Hannah Green (-12)
2) Maja Stark (-9)
3) Haeran Ryu (-6)
4) Jin Hee Im & Jin Young Ko (-5)
6) Nataliya Guseva & Emily Kristine Pedersen (-4)
8) Esther Henseleit, Madelene Sagström, Xiaowen Yin, Mao Saigo & Gaby Lopez (-3)
13) Celine Boutier, Ashleigh Buhai, Wei Ling Hsu, Nasa Hataoka, So Mi Lee, Hyo Joo Jang, Jennifer Kupcho, Charley Hull, Aline Krauter, Yan Liu, Hye Jin Choi & Kaitlin Papp
2023 LA Championship Top 20 & ties
1) Hannah Green (-9)*
2) Xiyu Lin & Aditi Ashok (-9)
4) Ayaka Furue & Ruoning Yin (-8)
6) Cheyenne Knight, Haeran Ryu & Nelly Korda (-7)
9) Jaravee Boonchant & Alison Lee (-6)
11) Nasa Hataoka & Chella Choi (-5)
13) Gemma Dryburgh, Sarah Kemp, Na Rin An & Stacy Lewis (-4)
17) Hye Jin Choi, Charley Hull, Yuna Nishimura, Perrine Delacour, Hyo Joo Kim, Madelene Sagström & Gina Kim (-3)
Stats (In the Field)
Top 20 for SG: Tee to Green
1) Yealimi Noh
3) Rio Takeda
5) Ina Yoon
6) Nasa Hataoka
7) Haeran Ryu
9) Akie Iwai
12) Nanna Koertz Madsen
14) Gaby Lopez
15) Kumkang Park
16) Albane Valenzuela & Elizabeth Szokol
18) Nelly Korda
20) Jeeno Thitikul
21) Lexi Thompson
22) Lauren Coughlin
23) Ashleigh Buhai & So Mi Lee
25) Hyo Joo Kim & Allisen Corpuz
27) Saki Baba
Top 20 for Scrambling
1) Miyū Yamashita
3) Hyo Joo Kim
5) Angel Yin
6) Yuri Yoshida
7) Kristen Gillman
8) Jin Hee Im
9) Paula Reto
10) Ashleigh Buhai
11) Miranda Wang
12) Lilia Vu
13) Saki Baba
14) So Mi Lee
16) Dewi Weber
17) Nelly Korda
18) Rio Takeda
19) Yahui Zhang
20) Albane Valenzuela
22) Minami Katsu
23) Amy Yang & Caley McGinty
Top 20 for Driving Accuracy
1) Andrea Lee
2) Ayaka Furue
4) Lauren Coughlin
5) Cheyenne Knight
6) Yuri Yoshida
7) Lilia Vu & Wei-Ling Hsu
9) Jasmine Suwannapura
10) Chisato Iwai
11) Hye Jin Choi
12) Lucy Li
13) Brooke Henderson, Aditi Ashok, Allisen Corpuz, Na Rin An & Caley McGinty
18) Hyo Joo Kim
19) Gurleen Kaur
20) Leona Maguire
Current Form of Top 16 players (Last 8 Strokeplay events, minus Matchplay)
Jeeno Thitikul (7/1) - 4/12/2/3/1/1/2/8
Nelly Korda (11/1) - 22/7/2/5/1/5/2/22
Haeran Ryu (16/1) - 17/18/14/14/35/20/3/3
Ayaka Furue (20/1) - 17/3/2/20/13/25/8/20
Yealimi Noh (22/1) - 6/7/11/1/25/4/22/16
Angel Yin (22/1) - 13/WD/1/10/18/2/MC/9
Minjee Lee (28/1) - 2/11/28/4/7/30/14/64
Nasa Hataoka (28/1) - 17/8/14/11/55/25/4/63
Hyo Joo Kim (30/1) - 1/7/45/28/10/35/MC/9
Hannah Green (30/1) - 44/7/4/20/4/19/MC/6
Jin Young Ko (33/1) - 53/MC/18/45/2/4/12/7
Rio Takeda (33/1) - MC/MC/1/21/9/45/8/5
Allisen Corpuz (35/1) - 3/21/7/23/22/35/14/57
Celine Boutier (40/1) - 27/30/29/28/7/14/12/8
Miyū Yamashita (40/1) - MC/11/8/21/4/6/1/4
Lilia Vu (40/1) - 2/29/61/40/34/63/52/58
Picks
Hannah Green 28/1 (6pl ew, William Hill)
Current Form
44th Ford Championship
7th HSBC Women's World Championship
4th Founders Cup
20th Tournament of Champions
4th ISPS Handa Australian Open
19th CME Globe Tour Championship
MC The Annika
6th Maybank Championship
1st BMW Ladies Open South Korea
Stats/Info
Ranks this year 8th GIR, 51st Approach. 58th T2G, 55th Scrambling, 10th Par 3 Scoring & 9th Bogey Avoidance
Ranked 1st, 28th & 4th in last 3 for Accuracy
Ranked 18th, 3rd & 4th in last 3 for Greens in Regulation
Ranked 37th, 23rd & 3rd in last 3 for Scrambling
Has only missed 1 cut in last 15 tournaments played in the state of California, a bit of a California specialist.
Jeeno is Jeeno and could easily win by five. Nelly could easily win just before the Chevron and Haeran Ryu has done well at this event in the two years with two top sevens. I'm going to start with the Los Angeles specialist in 6x LPGA Tour winner Hannah Green who of course has two wins here at LA Championship over the road at Wilshire Country Club. Although the Queen of California Poa Annua, I don't think it will affect Greeny too much as they move onto Bermuda this week. Her game is as consistent as ever and I'm led to believe that she came to El Caballero very early last week to visualise the course and get some reps in as she looks for a triple-peat in this event.
One of the best ball strikers in the world that excels in high stake events. Although a slower start to this year for Hannah's high standards but has still been flirting near the top of the leaderboards this year. In her last 15 visits to California it reads only one missed cut and has nine Top 15's in that time. Pretty awesome eh?
She's won this the past two years for me at 50/1 and 33/1. At 28/1, this is still quite an underrated price this week. She owes me nothing, the super Aussie.
Celine Boutier 35/1 (6pl ew, William Hill)
Current Form
Last 8 at Matchplay
27th Ford Championship
30th Blue Bay LPGA
29th HSBC Women's World Championship
28th Honda LPGA Thailand
7th Founders Cup
14th Tournament of Champions
12th CME Globe Tour Championship
Stats/Info
Ranks this year 14th for Putting, 45th for Approach, 43rd for Scrambling, 33rd for Accuracy & 15th for Par 5 Scoring
Ranked 12th, 10th, 21st, 12th & 1st in last 5 for SG: Putting.
Ranked 39th, 24th, 18th & 13th in last 4 for Approach.
Finished 13th in 2024 and has 5 Top 15's in California.
My next choice wasn't easy as it was between Boutier and Lauren Coughlin with the latter a finalist at Matchplay in the last event. I'm unsure what toll that will take even ten days later. I've gone with former Evian Championship winner Celine Boutier who has the type of range I'd consider backing her at 35-40/1 range.
I'll be first to admit I've never been a big backer of Boutier and although undeniably talented, she's kind of always been too short in the market to consider, often in the 20-25 range. She's been consistent for the first part of the year and the back end of last with form of 27/30/29/28/7/14/12 which for her standards is probably a little average. She's showing signs of back into form which consistened of getting to the last eight at Matchplay, which included one of the craziest matches of all time having to go through 28 holes (yes 28 holes) of her last 16 encounter with former major champion Ashleigh Buhai.
She's a very good putter as seen in her last five starts ranking 12/10/21/11/1 for putting and is usually a dependable ball striker. If she can keep that up then Celine should be up there. She also has five Top 15's in California, so strong claims.
Ashleigh Buhai 60/1 (6pl ew, William Hill)
Current Form
Last 16 at Matchplay
44th Ford Championship
11th Founders Cup
10th Tournament of Champions
MC The Annika
35th LOTTE Championship
39th Maybank Championship
6th BMW Ladies Open South Korea
Stats/Info
Ranks this year 30th for SG: Total, 19th for Approach, 23rd for T2G, 31st for Greens in Regulation, 25th for Accuracy, 14th for Around the Green & 16th for Par 4 Scoring.
Ranked 14th & 24th in 2 of last 3 for Putting.
Ranked 10th, 10th & 11th in last 3 for Scrambling
Ranked 29th, 19th & 7th in last 3 for Approach.
Finished 13th, 27th & 33rd in last 3 Regulation events in California.
One player that I feel is going under the radar a little in the mid-range is the vastly experienced Ashleigh Buhai who seems to have came back into form after a broken toe greatly derailed her season last year.
The 2022 AIG Women's Open Champion has two Top 15's in her last three strokeplay starts while also reaching Last 16 of Matchplay at Shadow Creek in a group that consisted of Charley Hull and Esther Henseleit.
One thing that former podcast guest Ash prides herself on is her patience on the golf course. It may be needed her with some bad breaks more than likely going to happen. Ash and long time caddy Tanya have had good success together and we know Ashleigh can win if it gets tough (ie Muirfield in 2022.) She's won a whopping 22 times in a 17 year career worldwide.
Ingrid Lindblad 100/1 (5pl ew, Ladbrokes)
Current Form
38th Ford Championship
MC Founders Cup
8th Epson Tour Championship
17th Murphy USA El Dorado Shootout
1st Tuscaloosa Toyota Classic
2nd Guardian Championship
MC Wildhorse Ladies Classic
27th Portland Classic
Stats/Info
Ranks this year in limited starts 2nd for Driving Distance, 33rd for Off the Tee, 38th for Putting, 69th for Tee to Green.
Ranked 13th Off the Tee, 47th Approach, 38th Greens in Regulation & 9th Driving Distance at Ford Championship.
Positive in both LPGA starts for Putting.
Finished 8th at Epson Tour Championship Finals in California.
I'm going to take a chance this week on the very explosive Swede star Ingrid Lindblad. I feel she will make her mark at this level eventually after one of the best amateur careers in collegiate history just behind Rose Zhang. Ingo won and participated in nearly every big event you can think of at amateur level and was talked up massively as a future Major winner once she turned pro.
In only her third start as a fully pledged LPGA Tour card holder this course, with it playing long, should suit Ingo's explosive power off-the-tee. She was respectable in all categories at Ford Championship when finishing 38th in Arizona. That should give her a confidence boost going forward making the weekend there and playing well in great spells. She has the chance to impress again this week and if she can keep the positive trend with the putter then she could defo be in with a shot at contention.
Ingo's caddy Scottie Leonard is a Los Angeles native and stays roughly about an hour from El Caballero. Scottie will know the course better than most this week having been there a few times in the past which could give Lindblad some vital insider knowledge on where is best to leave your misses. Biding her time but she has so much untapped potential.
Manon De Roey 140/1 (5pl ew, Bet365)
Current Form
MC Ford Championship
9th Ford New South Wales Open
1st Australian Women's Classic
MC Saudi International Ladies
MC Founders Cup
2nd Open de Espana
18th Aramco Series - Riyadh
2nd Hero Indian Women's Open
Stats/Info
Ranks this year 7th for Driving Distance, 23rd Around the Green, 44th for Approach & 66th For T2G on LPGA. Ranks 1st for Putting per Average, 2nd for Scrambling & 29th for Greens in Regulation on Ladies European Tour.
Ranked 19th & 2nd for Putting at NSW Open & Australian Women's Classic
Ranked 7th & 15th for Greens in Regulation at NSW Open & Australian Women's Classic.
Ranked 2nd at Australian Women's Classic for Driving Distance.
Manon finished in the top 5 at LPGA Final Q School to gain her LPGA card for 2025.
Now for a player of Manon De Roey's quality. A best finish of T17th on LPGA in 2023 is surprising but she's a super player having won three times on Ladies European Tour. The most recent being at a tough Coffs Harbour in New South Wales at Australian Women's Classic where she played a worldie at 54th hole to beat Cara Gainer by a shot to win her third title. Which was so clutch to watch albeit on Gainer myself!
LPGA can make or break LET players as shown in the past with the likes of Olivia Cowan and even last year with Alexandra Försterling (a 4x LET winner.) It's a tough school and after finishing ninth and first in the back-to-back events in Australia on LET, she only missed the cut in Arizona by a shot which considering, it's a hell of a way to go travel wise is unlucky. I think she's a much better player than what she's shown and I'm happy to give her a chance this week where her Distance could be a useful weapon.
Manon has been back in Europe over the past couple of weeks back at her home club of Rinkven in Antwerp, Belgium looking to tune up for a long run on LPGA Tour coming up. I think it's about time the 33-year-old Belgian star shows what she's really made of stateside. She's a quality player!
Thanks to all for reading as always, enjoy the Golf and good luck with your picks!
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