The Team Matches, first staged by the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia in May 1897 and conducted in the spring of each year, are the oldest and largest of all women’s golf competitions in the United States.
More than 1,100 players from clubs within the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s authority compete for 22 cups in five inter-club matches in March and April. To provide perspective, the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia is the country’s oldest women’s organization in the sport.
The highest level of competition is the Philadelphia Cup, which has been dominated by the teams from Merion Golf Club. The Ardmore, Pennsylvania, club – which has hosted a nation-leading 19 USGA championships – has claimed 74 Philadelphia Cups in 126 competitions, including a 4-1 record in 2024. Merion’s 10-women 2024 “A” team – which sends out seven players in each match – was composed of Catherine Elliott, Kimberly Garno, Liz Haines, Loraine Jones, Kaitlyn Lees, Jackie Rogowicz, Katie Sibel, Kimberly Simmons, Olivia Traynor and Libbie Warner.
Clubs such as Merion, Philadelphia Cricket, Huntingdon Valley and Aronimink have as many as six teams in the yearly competition.
Nancy Porter and Liz Haines are two of Merion’s most veteran competitors, and they embody the spirit of excellence of play that has brought Merion its astounding 74 wins.
Porter – whose mother, the legendary Dot Germain Porter, won the 1949 U.S. Women’s Amateur at her beloved home club, Merion – has played in the Philadelphia Cup since 1975.
“It’s been a great part of my life, a privilege to be a part of these matches for so many years,” Porter said.
A college field hockey coach at William & Mary from 1975 to 1981, Porter won the 1993 Pennsylvania Women’s Amateur, interrupting the streak of World Golf Hall of Famer Carol Semple Thompson, who won eight of nine in 1978-86.
Porter is a psychology instructor at Villanova University, just up the road from Merion. Porter earned a doctorate in psychology at the University of Pennsylvania after her coaching career and also taught for 20 years at Chestnut Hill College in Philadelphia.
“The Team Matches have a lot of things going for them,” said Porter, a member of the Ursinus College Hall of Fame for field hockey and basketball. “Some very good young players are taking this tradition forward, and I’m pretty sure their experiences will give them the same challenges and pleasure that they have given Liz and myself.”
Porter, who made a hole-in-one at two U.S. Women’s Opens (1972 at Winged Foot and 1976 at Rolling Green), has seen the evolution of the quality of the competition in the Team Matches and said the average handicap of the top eight Merion players is 2. “That has never been the case before,” she said. “I am on the second team, where I belong.”
The Merion legacy at the Philadelphia Cup is passed down from generation to generation like an oral history. The women of Merion take their record seriously, but they do not pass up the good times.
“We have a lot of fun together,” Porter said. “It is a very congenial group. There are no outliers that don’t get along. That is enhanced by Scott [Nye, Merion’s director of golf] and his crew. It is a positive experience. It isn’t overly competitive. There is a lot of pride in playing on the team. It is a ridiculously strong record over the years. It is self-enhancing, I think.”
Haines agrees with Porter on Merion’s ability to “pass the torch.”
“When you realize the women that came before you, you don’t need to be told,” Haines said of the club’s legacy in the Philadelphia Cup. “Our obligation was to uphold our status in history at Merion Golf Club. It was very seriously taken. We never had a cavalier attitude about this competition. You worked hard on your game in the spring, and you come out on top. Merion instills that in people.”
Haines, who played on the victorious Pennsylvania team with Carol Semple Thompson and the late Judy Oliver in the inaugural USGA Women’s State Team Championship in 1995, is a club champion at Merion an enviable and remarkable 16 times and still plays on the club’s No. 1 squad in the Team Matches.
“When you have more than 1,100 women competing for five days in the spring, that is a tremendous accomplishment. And the matches are not handicap events, which is unheard of today.” – Liz Haines
She qualified for nearly 40 USGA championships over five decades and won two Philadelphia Amateurs as well as five Philadelphia stroke-play championships. She also played in the North & South Women’s Amateur and the Eastern Amateur and credits her success to the encouragement of her late husband. George Haines won two New Jersey State Amateurs, played in 10 U.S. Amateurs, seven British Amateurs and 20 Canadian Amateurs. He also qualified for the 1968 U.S. Open at Oak Hill Country Club.
As a member of the executive committee of the Women’s Golf Association of Philadelphia and a competitor in its events since 1980, Haines has hands-on experience as an administrator as well.
“When you have more than 1,100 women competing for five days in the spring, that is a tremendous accomplishment,” Haines said. “And the matches are not handicap events, which is unheard of today.”
Haines, the runner-up in the 2004 U.S. Women’s Senior Amateur, was part of Merion’s string of eight straight wins in 1981-88.
“It was a great stretch,” she said, “but we were pushing for 10, which is greedy. But we go for the milestones.”
Haines is grateful for the high-level competition so close to home.
“It’s given me such a great opportunity to work on my golf game and to reach goals and to have a focus,” she said with pride. “It’s the foundation of my career. It’s what I build off. Merion and WGAP are my foundation for anything I achieve in the USGA. It’s a big part of my career.”
Jaw-dropping achievements such as Merion’s performance in the WGAP Team Matches do not need laudatory adjectives. The results don’t lie.
“I don’t think there is any club in the country with a long-standing record like this,” Porter said.