Alaska’s growing youth golf scene is well-represented at 2025 State Amateur Championship

Among the nearly 100 golfers who took the greens for the first day of the 2025 Alaska State Amateur Championship at the Anchorage Golf Course on Friday morning were many of the top youngsters the 49th state has to offer.

The number of high school and college-aged golfers nearly reached double figures, which is an uptick from the small handful that have taken part in the past. That’s a sign that interest from the next generation is growing.

“We have some unbelievable young golfers,” President of Alaska Golf Association Jeff Ranf said. “We’ve had more interest on the youth side than we’ve had in years and I don’t know why.”

He feels like it might be a combination of some of the top golfers coming up, combined with the Alaska Golf Association being recognized as the organization many of them want to play through as potential reasons the sport is becoming more popular among the younger generation.

Another contributing factor is the proliferation of pathways golf is creating for kids to earn scholarships to get their college educations paid for.

“All the young really good golfers have been saying how much they are looking forward to continuing playing after high school and into college and perhaps going pro,” Ranf said. “That’s huge.”

Since golf isn’t one of the sanctioned sports offered through any school districts in the state, many of the top youth golfers either try to get in as much time on the golf courses Alaska has to offer when they can or travel out of state to compete and further develop their skills.

Anchorage’s Briggs Winfree is one of the latter. The 16-year-old spends his winters down in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, and plays at Junior Players Golf Academy but he loves the chance to come back home and compete.

“It’s a ton of fun,” he said. “The golf up here is second to none. It’s so much fun and a great community.”

Without scholastic programs, many kids in the past were never introduced to golf at a young age.

“It definitely starts at a lower level then works its way up,” Ranf said. “We’re wanting to get more involved with youth golf so we’re working with clubs like Anchorage Golf, Palmer, Fox Hollow and Moose (Run).”

The Moose Run golf course, in particular, approached the AGA about getting help promoting their youth program.

“The more we get involved in those programs, the more the youth are going to take interest in events such as this,” Ranf said.

Just before the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, their membership and interest in the golf scene in general was starting to wane. After the pandemic hit, it dropped even more precipitously. Tournaments were sparsely attended even when quarantine ended but now they feel like they’re finally back on the rise again thanks to an injection of new blood at the executive leadership level.

“We have some younger board members than we’ve had in the past,” Ranf said. “We had a lot of guys and women that had been on the board for 10 to 15 years that want to get off and now we have really good young players that are on the board and they want to see the game of golf grow in Alaska.”

He believes the younger generation is the driving force behind the uptick in interest in golf around the state and is excited for the direction the sport in the Last Frontier is heading.

“I love to see it,” Palmer’s Keira DeLand said. “There’s definitely a handful of us which is so cool to see.”

There was a junior golfer as young as 13 on the greens Friday competing in her first ever state championship event.

“Hopefully, we can see more kids following us,” DeLand said.

She believes that getting more camps and tournaments as well as just “publicizing golf more” will continue to drum up interest in sport among younger generations.

“The junior golf is great, especially with the youth on-course program out here,” Winfree said. “You can get a $5 round for 18 (holes) or $3 for 9 (holes). Every course has a junior rate so they really support junior golf which is awesome.”

He started playing competitively two summers ago and won his first junior tournament in town at Fox Hollow Golf Course but fell in love with the sport the first time he played it with his dad on a whim one day.

“Honestly, I just think it’s about making it more fun for the kids with a lot of games and camps,” Winfree said. “There’s definitely more kids coming with their parents too.”

Developing women’s golf is a priority

DeLand is one of Alaska’s most recent success stories as she earned a scholarship to play golf at Lee University, a private Christian university in Cleveland, Tennessee.

She is coming off her freshman year and last summer, swept both the women’s Alaska State Amateur Championship and State Match Play.

“It was awesome,” DeLand said. “It was a great learning experience and super fun to play with girls my age and just be around golf all the time year round.”

[After claiming Alaska’s premier amateur golf titles, Keira DeLand is taking her talents to the next level]

Growing up in Alaska, there weren’t many girls her age to compete against. As a result, she was accustomed to playing with older women and males of all ages so going to play collegiately with and against her contemporaries was a welcomed culture shock.

“It was fun being around people my age who love the game as much as I do,” DeLand said.

The school year went by fast and she was so busy having fun that she didn’t start getting home sick until it was almost time to head back to Alaska for the summer.

“It was awesome to go to a structured practice everyday and be around a great group of girls,” DeLand said. “The whole year was really a highlight.”

She and Abigail Ante, who attends and competes for the University of Missouri-St. Louis, are two of the strongest young female players in the state. Unfortunately, there aren’t many others for them to contend with.

“That’s the one thing I think we lack,” Ranf said. “Other than working directly with the junior program, we haven’t been promoting women’s golf enough.”

That is starting to change as AGA is becoming more involved with the women’s programs such as Anchorage Women’s Golf Association and Wacky Women’s Golf Association.

“I think that will hopefully encourage more young women to play in these events, because we don’t get a lot of women,” Ranf said. “It’s unfortunate, because there are so many good players that we’d love to join us but we haven’t been able to get them yet.”

Takeaways from Day 1’s action

Back in late June, Winfree won 2025 Alaska State Golf Association’s Match Play Championship at Moose Run Golf Course where he bested heavy favorite, Erik Thompson in an 18-hole title tilt and won on the third extra match-play hole.

He didn’t let that recent success go to his head or bloat his confidence heading into this weekend’s action.

“The last tournament doesn’t matter because this is a whole different tournament,” Winfree said. “I came into it with no expectations and just tried to play my best.”

He felt good about his performance on the first day, shooting a 76. He was 1-under through 15 and 5-over through his last three holes.

Even though her home course that she is the most familiar with is out in Palmer, DeLand still managed to shoot a 78 on Day 1 of the state championship tournament.

“It was pretty solid, definitely room for improvement,” DeLand said. “I’m still trying to figure out these greens a little bit but I’m excited for the rest of the weekend.”