Las Vegas resident Gigi Stoll eyes LPGA Tour playing card

Gigi Stoll had one of the most decorated careers as a junior golfer in the Pacific Northwest. She’s hoping to rediscover that success in 2021 and earn her LPGA Tour playing card.

Stoll is gearing up for her third season on the Symetra Tour, the circuit that grants full playing privileges on the LPGA Tour to the top 10 finishers each season.

Stoll is launching that quest as one of the newest members of the Las Vegas community. She moved to the valley last spring looking for places to play when the coronavirus pandemic shut down golf courses in Arizona, where she was living. And now, with the help of the team at Reflection Bay Club at Lake Las Vegas, she is focused on chasing that playing card.

“That is the ultimate goal,” she said.

Stoll’s first year on the Symetra Tour brought a mixed bag of results. She had three top-five finishes, but also missed eight cuts in 21 events. Last year was more consistent, but she only played seven tournaments in a pandemic-shortened season.

Barbara Moxness, a former LPGA Tour player, is helping to get her to the next level.

“She’s working with me primarily on my short game,” Stoll said of her coach. “I need to do a better job of getting the ball in the hole once I get around the greens.”

Getting to the greens hasn’t been an issue for the 24-year-old. She ranked in the top 10 on the tour last year in driving distance and driving accuracy, a rare combination. But Stoll said she lost too many strokes after the tee shot.

“In and around the greens, I just need to be more precise,” she said.

Stoll is trying to get back to the days of her youth in Oregon, where she was a four-time Pacific Northwest Golf Association Player of the Year, seven-time Oregon Golf Association Player of the Year, and winner of two 6A state championships, three Oregon Amateur titles and three Oregon Junior Championship crowns.

Her junior success landed her a scholarship to women’s golf powerhouse Arizona, where she helped the Wildcats to the 2018 NCAA championship.

Life as a professional has been more difficult, but that’s to be expected given the level of competition on the Symetra Tour.

“It’s really an excellent tour,” Stoll said. “Everyone out here was a top college player or had been on the LPGA Tour previously. The level of play is elite.”

Stoll is hoping her association with Reflection Bay will give her the home course she needs to refine her game.

“Reflection Bay is so unique,” she said. “Every time I play there, it feels like a vacation. It has good facilities and everything I was looking for in a course.”

Stoll’s season begins March 18 with the Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic in Mesa, Arizona, the first of 21 events on the schedule. She plans to play all of them in her quest for LPGA playing privileges.

If she makes it, she’ll follow a host of past Arizona players to the big stage — including Hall of Famers Annika Sorenstam and Lorena Ochoa, and current players Haley Moore, Lindsey Weaver and Alison Walshe.

Stoll has admiration for all of them, but Ochoa holds a special place in her heart. In 2007, Stoll was a standard bearer for an LPGA event in Portland in which she was grouped with Ochoa for the final round. Despite winning the tournament, Ochoa took the time walking up the 18th fairway during the final round to chat with a preteen Stoll.

“She was just so humble to be talking to me in that situation,” Stoll said. “It is a really cool memory.”

LPGA update

The LPGA has removed a new match-play event from the 2021 schedule on its website, but a tour spokesperson said not to read anything into that action.

The tournament, slated for the last week of May and announced without a venue, is still a go, according to Christina Lance, director of tour media.

“The event is definitely still on the schedule,” Lance said. “We are just awaiting some final details before we are able to share information.”

Las Vegas is among the potential locations for the tournament.

Greg Robertson is a freelance reporter who covers golf for the Review-Journal. He can be reached at robertsongt@gmail.com.