STANFORD, Calif. - Rising junior Maverick McNealy of Portola Valley, California, was one of five players selected to the United States Walker Cup team on Monday, the United States Golf Association announced. He is the 11th Stanford men’s golfer to represent his country.
Former Cardinal standout and current PGA Tour regular Patrick Rodgers competed for the United States in 2011 and 2013.
McNealy was the national player of the year following the 2014-15 season and won the prestigious Jack Nicklaus Award and Haskins Award.
The remaining five members of the United States Walker Cup team will be named following the U.S. Amateur Championship (Aug. 17-23) at Olympia Fields (Ill.) Country Club. The 10-player team will face Great Britain and Ireland on Sept. 12-13 at Royal Lytham & St. Annes in England. The United States holds a 35-8-1 lead in the biennial match that first began in 1922.
“It’s a huge honor for Maverick to represent our country and our program,” said Conrad Ray, the Knowles Family Director of Men’s golf at Stanford. “It’s really the world’s elite amateur golfers that are chosen and this is a real feather in his cap. One of his goals this year was to make the Walker Cup team and for him to achieve that is pretty neat. He’s very fired up about it.”
At 19, McNealy is currently the youngest member of the American team chosen Monday. Also picked were: Bryson DeChambeau, 21, of Clovis, California; Beau Hossler, 22, of Mission Viejo, California; Lee McCoy, 21, of Athens, Georgia; and Hunter Stewart, 22, of Nicholasville, Georiga.
McNealy, the Pac-12 Conference individual champion and Player of the Year, won an NCAA-best six tournaments this past season and established a Stanford single-season scoring record of 69.05, the second-lowest in NCAA history.
He recently tied for second in the 49th Pacific Coast Amateur Championship in Eugene, Oregon, and made two cuts on the PGA Tour, tying for 60th in the Greenbrier Classic and finished 78th at the Barbasol Championship. McNealy also played for the victorious United States Palmer Cup team this year.
A Pac-12 All-Academic second team selection, McNealy is majoring in management science and engineering.
Stanford could have a second participant in the Walker Cup match. Rising senior David Boote of Surrey, England, is one of 20 players to be selected to the initial Great Britain and Ireland team, and recently won the The Welsh Amateur. The human biology major was an All-Pac-12 second team choice in 2014-15 with a 71.82 stroke average.