Photo Credit: Isaiah Bell/Epson Tour
Indian Wells, California — Championship Sunday felt less like the close of a golf season and more like the closing act of a novel. The sun hung low over the San Jacinto Mountains, desert air still shimmering from a hundred-degree day, and fifteen LPGA Tour cards were waiting to be claimed.
When the final putt finally fell — after five grueling playoff holes, a sunset, and a dozen near-misses — Anne Chen, a 24-year-old Duke graduate with the quiet poise of a veteran, raised her arms and let out a breath she’d been holding since May.
Her win at the 2025 Epson Tour Championship wasn’t just the biggest moment of her young career — it was the punctuation mark on a season that changed everything.
A Sunday Meant for the Nerves
The morning began under an orange desert sky, the mountains glowing in the distance, and the leaderboard tighter than a drum. Teen phenom Yana Wilson — who had slept on the 54-hole lead after rounds of 64 and 68 — looked calm walking to the first tee. But nerves show up differently in the desert: short irons fly a yard too far, putts slide a hair too much. Wilson’s 73 would cost her the trophy but not her LPGA card.
Behind her, the pack formed: Anne Chen, Sophia Schubert, Agathe Laisne, Isabella Fierro, and a handful of players with everything to gain. Every birdie felt like a job offer; every bogey, a missed interview.
By the turn, Chen had erased the gap. Birdies at 4, 6, and 8 brought her to −21. Schubert, the 2022 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion, matched her with birdies at 2 and 3. The crowd around the ninth green — a mix of parents, agents, and fellow pros — began whispering playoff scenarios by lunchtime.
And by 5:00 p.m., they got one.
The Five-Hole Marathon
If you’ve ever stood on a tee box during an Epson playoff, you know the sound — silence so heavy it feels like a weight on your chest. Chen and Schubert traded pars on 18, then again, then again. Three trips up the same fairway, the same murmuring crowd, the same desert stillness.
The fourth playoff hole nearly ended it: Schubert’s wedge spun back to six feet, Chen answered from eight. Both made birdie. On the fifth, the nerves cracked. Schubert’s second found the front fringe and trickled into the collar. Chen, with a 20-foot uphill look, lagged to inches. When Schubert’s par putt missed left, Chen tapped in, dropped her putter, and covered her mouth.
“It’s been a long season,” Chen said afterward. “There were times I wondered if I’d get here. To finally finish it off — it’s a dream.”
The Shots That Told the Story
This championship didn’t hinge on one swing — it was defined by a dozen perfect ones.
- On the par-3 13th, Chen stuffed an 8-iron to three feet — the shot that pulled her even with Schubert and flipped momentum for good.
- Valery Plata, the fiery Colombian, reeled off six straight birdies from holes 2 through 7, her longest run of the season. “I didn’t even realize it was six in a row,” she laughed later. “I just kept walking to the next tee smiling.”
- Agathe Laisne, calm and calculating, rolled in a 15-footer on 16 to reach −19. “I wanted one more, but it’s okay,” she said. “Finishing strong means more than the number.”
- Isabella Fierro, the Mexican star who’s carried her flag proudly all season, eagled the short par-4 third and finished T-3 at −19, good enough to guarantee her LPGA return.
Every one of those swings was a moment in miniature — the kind of thing you only notice when a season’s worth of tension meets one desert afternoon.
Image Credit: Isaiah Bell/ Epson Tour
Fifteen Passports to the LPGA
When the dust settled, fifteen names became forever linked: the 2025 Epson Tour Graduates, the next generation of LPGA players, and the heart of what this tour exists for.
1. Melanie Green – Player of the Year and Gaelle Truet Rookie of the Year, with two victories and ten top-tens.
2. Gina Kim – Three wins, top-five scoring average, and the confidence of a seasoned pro.
3. Yana Wilson – The 19-year-old prodigy who led the money list for much of the summer.
4. Sophia Schubert – Bounced back from losing her LPGA card in 2024 with relentless consistency.
5. Erika Hara – The Japanese veteran with the quietest walk and the cleanest swing on tour.
6. Briana Chacón – Oregon alum who turned promise into polish.
7. Riley Smyth – The Virginia standout with 300-yard power and a soft putting stroke.
8. Laetitia Beck – The Tel Aviv trailblazer making her long-awaited LPGA return.
9. Minji Kang – Korea’s steadiest scorer and queen of fairways hit.
10. Hailee Cooper – Another Duke product, blending Texan grit with tour-ready calm.
11. Anne Chen – The champion of Indian Wells.
12. Isabella Fierro – Mexico’s emotional heartbeat and the crowd favorite of the year.
13. Michelle Zhang – Stanford freshman who turned pro mid-season and never looked back.
14. Carla Tejedo Mulet – Spain’s rising star, fearless under pressure.
15. Laney Frye – Kentucky’s quiet assassin, who birdied her last hole of the year to sneak into the top 15.
Each one will walk the range at next season’s LPGA opener knowing they earned it — not through exemptions, but through months of bus rides, cheap hotels, and 6:00 a.m. tee times.
“It’s not the glamorous side of golf,” said Green. “But it’s the side that makes you who you are.”
The Duke Connection: A Pipeline in Full Bloom
For a program that’s long defined collegiate excellence, Duke University is quietly rewriting the map of professional women’s golf. In just one season, Erica Shepherd, Gina Kim, and Anne Chen each won on the Epson Tour. That makes four different Blue Devils (counting Hailee Cooper) earning LPGA status this year.
“It’s a testament to the culture,” Chen said. “At Duke, we learned how to win together. You carry that with you.”
When she sank her final putt at Indian Wells, a handful of former teammates — Shepherd, Kim, and Jaravee Boonchant — stood just off the green. They didn’t cheer loudly; they smiled knowingly. Another Blue Devil had made it.
A Season That Redefined the Epson Tour
This wasn’t just another year on golf’s proving ground — it was a statement.
Twenty-six different winners in twenty-five events. Record scoring averages. Record prize money. And a global cast that stretched from Hawaii to Sweden, from Mexico to Japan.
The 2025 Epson Tour season told the world that the line between the LPGA and its feeder tour is thinner than ever. These players aren’t learning the ropes anymore — they’re sharpening their blades.
And as Commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan said earlier this week, “The women who play here today will be winning on the LPGA tomorrow.”
You only needed to watch Chen’s final walk up 18 to see it coming true.
Final Leaderboard — Epson Tour Championship, Indian Wells
| Pos | Player | Score |
|---|---|---|
| P1 | Anne Chen | −22 (65 playoff win) |
| P2 | Sophia Schubert | −22 |
| T3 | Agathe Laisne | −19 |
| T3 | Isabella Fierro | −19 |
| T5 | Megan Schofill | −18 |
| T5 | Annabelle Pancake-Webb | −18 |
| 7 | Yana Wilson | −17 |
| 8 | Valery Plata | −16 |
| 9 | Gina Kim | −15 |
| 10 | Riley Smyth | −15 |
What Sunday Meant
For some, it was validation. For others, redemption. For Anne Chen, it was the day a steady career became a story. She’d been overlooked in college, overshadowed early as a pro, and even joked earlier this week that she “wasn’t sure if anyone noticed her out here.”
They noticed her now.
When she finally sat down at the scorer’s table, sand still in her hair and eyes rimmed red from the desert wind, she smiled and whispered, “I guess I’m going to the LPGA.”
There’s no guess anymore. The Epson Tour built her — and fifteen more like her — for this very moment.
And as the sun fell over the mountains and the shadows stretched across the fairways of Indian Wells, you could feel it: the future of women’s golf was already here, glowing in desert gold.
