SAINT-QUENTIN-EN-YVELINES, France – New Zealand’s Lydia Ko and Switzerland’s Morgane Metraux are on the verge of Olympic glory with one round remaining at Le Golf National.
Success on Sunday would mean twofold celebrations for Ko, as a gold medal would round out her Olympic trifecta – she’s taken silver and bronze in the 2016 and 2020 Games, respectively – and would earn her a place in the LPGA Hall of Fame, giving her the 27th point necessary for automatic qualification. It would also make Ko the first player since 2016 gold medalist Inbee Park to automatically qualify for the LPGA Hall of Fame based on point accumulation.
Both the gold medal and Hall of Fame are two career accomplishments that have continued to elude Ko over the years. She finished five shots behind Park to claim silver in Rio and was one stroke off Korda’s pace in Tokyo, ultimately securing bronze after falling to Japan’s Mone Inami in a podium playoff.
Her Hall-of-Fame hopes were bolstered when she won the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions on the LPGA Tour in January, a victory that earned Ko her 26th HOF point and moved her to within one of the 27 points needed to take her rightful place alongside some of female golf’s greatest superstars.
She nearly got the job done the very next week at the LPGA Drive On Championship, finishing solo second at Bradenton Country Club after losing to Nelly Korda in a playoff in Florida, and the Hall of Fame has been just out of reach ever since for Ko.
That is, until this week at the Paris Olympics.
Ko currently shares the 54-hole lead with Metraux at 9-under overall, and while she has maintained that she’s focusing on what’s right in front of her, the 27-year-old has surely let her mind wander to what the gold medal would feel like around her neck at Le Golf National.
Or at the very least, thought about how she’ll reunite the bronze, silver and gold medals when the three are in her possession at the end of Saturday’s final round.
“I do think that because I have two medals under my belt, I’ve got nothing to lose,” Ko said as the only multiple female medalist in the history of the Olympic women’s golf competition. “I know that I’m going to give it my all, and I’m going to try my 100 percent, and if it’s meant to happen, it’s going to happen.
“I know that feeling. Standing on the podium is definitely a once-in-a-lifetime kind of (fairy)-tale emotion that you feel, and I would love to feel that again tomorrow. But there’s still 18 very difficult holes in front of me, so I’m just going to focus on that and see where that puts me.”
Metraux is eyeing Switzerland’s first-ever podium spot and has looked unflappable throughout the week at Le Golf National, even after finding herself in some unpleasant positions at the difficult Olympic venue.
She carded a steady 2-under 70 during Wednesday’s first round and then backed that up with an impressive 6-under 66 on Day 2, a round that saw the Swiss fire an Olympic nine-hole record of 28 on the front nine of her second round.
Friday’s third round saw Metraux scrape together a 1-under 71 effort, with the highlight of her day coming on the last after the Swiss found the green in two and drained a 19-foot, 4-inch putt to get back in the red for the round.
The 27-year-old isn’t a stranger to winning in France – she took home the 2024 Jabra Ladies Open title on the Ladies European Tour in Evian-les-Bains earlier this year – but the Olympic stage is not one on which she’s used to standing. Metraux made her Games debut this week, electing to forgo her spot in Tokyo 2020 so she could pursue her LPGA Tour card via LPGA Qualifying Series and serendipitously passing the torch to her sister Kim, who finished 54th in Japan.
With Switzerland sitting so close to France on mainland Europe, Metraux has had a beaucoup of fans supporting her this week just outside of Paris, waving the Swiss flag and crying, “Hop Suisse!” every chance they get when she is within earshot. It’s a level of support that has carried Metraux through at Le Golf National and one she will continue to lean on as she works to earn a medal for her country for the first time in the Olympic women’s golf competition.
“I came in this week telling myself, it’s medal or nothing,” Metraux said. “So just give it everything without attacking too much but within reason. I think I need to go into every event with that mentality because it seems to be working well. It’s fun to play in front of so many people and have so much support and play so close to home. It’s really a lot of fun.”
In a tie for third at 7-under with Olympic dreams of their own are Japan’s Miyu Yamashita and Rose Zhang. Yamashita is trying to follow in her fellow countrywoman Inami’s footsteps at the Paris Olympics and is currently in prime position to add to Japan’s medal count at Le Golf National.
“I was excited and also impressed by Mone Inami’s performance getting a silver medal,” Yamashita said. “Here I am competing for that same medal, so I’ll do my best tomorrow and enjoy the experience.”
Zhang only turned professional last May after a standout collegiate career at Stanford University and has already lived an entire career in the 441 days since she announced on Instagram that she was going pro.
The 21-year-old stunned the golf world at large by winning in her professional debut at the 2023 Mizuho Americas Open, the first person to do so on the LPGA Tour since Beverly Hanson in 1951. The victory helped Zhang secure a spot on her first U.S. Solheim Cup team last year at Finca Cortesin in Andalucia, Spain, and she earned a half point for the Americans as a rookie.
Zhang then captured her second LPGA Tour title earlier this season at the Cognizant Founders Cup, defeating Madelene Sagstrom by two shots at Upper Montclair Country Club.
An Olympic medal would be the cherry on top of an amazing week at the Paris Olympics for the young superstar, who has arguably had just as much fun trading pins as she has playing golf, and Zhang plans to take the final round in stride as she works to find another podium spot for Team USA at the Olympic women’s golf competition.
“What I can do and what I can control is the most important,” said Zhang. “I’m here to enjoy the grind, and I know I’m going to have to grind tomorrow, but you just have to be in the moment.”