Top 10 finishes highlight South’s offseason

Rick Fowler

Batesville’s Ava South continues to make her name known around the state. The three-time state finalist was a Top 10 finisher in four offseason events since the month of April.

Will 2025 finally be the year that Batesville star Ava South breaks free and claims the IHSAA Girls Golf State Championship? Given her results from the offseason, one would venture to say that just very well could happen as South has posted four Top 10 finishes around the state since April.

South, an incoming senior for the Lady Bulldogs who finished third in 2022, second in 2023 and fifth in 2025 at the state finals, has posted her Top 10 finishes in statewide competition sponsored by the Indiana Junior Golf program.

This past week saw South’s best finish of five overall events, earning a runner-up spot in the Indiana Age Group Championship. Competing in the 17-year-old field at Swan Lake Resort in Plymouth, she posted an 18-hole 81 in round one but bounced back with a seven-over par 79 in the final round to be at +16 for the event. She was four strokes back of champion Josephine Zangrilli of Munster.

The performance piggybacked off of the Girls State Junior Championships last month at Coyote Crossing in West Lafayette where South tied for ninth overall with a nine-over par score over three rounds of action. After a bit of disaster with a 79 on day one, she came back strong with back-to-back one-over par 73 performances to earn the Top 10 spot. Incoming Carmel freshman Maya Fujisawa-Keuling sat at one-over with scores of 73, 71 and 73 to win the title.

Rowan Pies, a senior from East Central and friendly nemesis to South out on the course, also competed and was at +6 to finish fifth on the leaderboard. The two state finalists will join up as teammates beginning in the fall of 2026 as both have committed to play golf at NCAA Division I Illinois-Chicago.

South started the offseason with a seventh place finish and fourth place finish inside the Indiana Girls Spring Series which was held all the way back in April and May. The start of June saw her finish 17th in the Indiana Junior PGA Championship in Muncie.

The girls golf offseason is quickly fading as the sport is less than a month out from regular season competition. South and the Lady Bulldogs will once again be the area’s top team and are expected to appear in the preseason state rankings.

Batesville is scheduled to open the year on August 5 at the Union County Invitational.