Joe Highsmith of Lakewood, Wash., Eric Ansett of Spokane, Wash. and Reid Hatley of Hayden Lake, Idaho have been selected to represent the Washington State Golf Association at this year’s Morse Cup team competition, which will take place simultaneously with the 52nd Pacific Coast Amateur Championship held at The Olympic Club in San Francisco, Calif.
The 2018 Pacific Coast Amateur will be held July 24-27, with the Morse Cup competition taking place during the first two days of the 72-hole competition. Two of the top three scores from each team in rounds one and two will count for the Morse Cup portion of the event.
Highsmith is a recent graduate of Bellarmine Prep in Tacoma, and will be playing for Pepperdine University in the fall. He won the WIAA 4A High School State Championship as a junior, and then really broke out in 2017, winning the WSGA Men’s State Amateur and being selected to the Junior Presidents Cup and a Rolex Junior All-American. He was named the WSGA Junior Boys’ Player of the Year in 2017 (for the second consecutive year), and also the 2017 PNGA Junior Boys’ Player of the Year. In mid-July he played in his fourth consecutive U.S. Junior Amateur.
Ansett just graduated from Lipscomb University in Tennessee, where for the second year in a row he was named the Atlantic Sun Conference Men’s Golf Scholar-Athlete of the Year. He has qualified for the U.S. Open sectional qualifier three times, was runner-up in the 2018 Tennessee State Open, and finished 13th in the 2017 Northeast Amateur.
Hatley is a three-time WSGA Men’s Mid-Amateur Player of the Year (2015-2017) and three-time PNGA Men’s Mid-Amateur Player of the Year (2015-2017). In 2017 he was medalist at a U.S. Amateur Sectional qualifier, and finished runner-up in the 2017 Stocker Cup. In June he tied for sixth in the 2018 Mexican Amateur, and earlier this month he made it to the quarterfinals of the PNGA Men’s Amateur.
Meet the team:
Joe Highsmith
Lakewood, Wash. – Pepperdine University
- 2017 Washington State Amateur - Champion
- 2017 Rolex Junior All-American
- 2017 Junior President's Cup
- 2017 AJGA Invitational-Polo - Runner Up
- 2017 PNGA Junior Boys’ Player of the Year
- 2016 and 2017 WSGA Junior Boys’ Player of the Year
- 2018 U.S. Junior Amateur - Quarterfinalist
Eric Ansett
Spokane, Wash. – Lipscomb University
- 2018 SeaBest Invite - T-1st
- 2018 TN State Open - Runner Up
- 2018 ASUN Conference Men’s Golf Scholar-Athlete of the Year
- 2018 A-Sun Tournament - 3rd
- 2017 Northeast Amateur - 13th
- 3-time U.S. Open Sectional Qualifier
- 2018 Southern Amateur - 3rd
Reid Hatley
Hayden Lake, Idaho – University of Arizona
- 2017 Stocker Cup - Runner Up
- 2016 WSGA Mid-Amateur – Champion
- 2018 Mexican Amateur – T6
- WSGA Mid-Amateur Player of the Year - 2015-2017
- PNGA Mid-Amateur Player of the Year - 2015-2017
About the Pacific Coast Amateur Championship
The Pacific Coast Amateur Championship is one of the oldest and most prestigious amateur golf championships in North America. The first tournament was held on the links of San Francisco Golf Club at The Presidio in 1901. After being played until 1911, The Pacific Coast Amateur then ceased to exist, only to be reconstituted at Seattle Golf Club in 1967. Today, 15 member Pacific Rim golf associations comprise the Pacific Coast Golf Association.
Held on an annual basis since 1967, the Pacific Coast Amateur Championship boasts a rich history of showcasing some of the most talented golfers in the United States and Canada.
Past champions of the Pacific Coast Amateur who have gone on to successful professional careers include PGA Tour winners Billy Mayfair (1987, 1988), Jason Gore (1997) and Ben Crane (1998) as well as Web.com Tour winners and brothers Michael Putnam (2004) and Andrew Putnam (2010).
For more information on the championship, visit www.pacificcoastamateur.com. Spectators and media are welcome to attend with entrance being free of charge.
Media requests please contact:
Christopher McGrath
Media & Recruiting Director
pcgamedia@gmail.com
905.242.3376
@PacificCoastAm | #paccoast
