Emilia Doran’s passion for golf shines on Pinehurst No. 2 The 2022 North & South Champion yearns to compete and play great golf. She's doing both as the top seed.

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By Alex Podlogar

Anybody who questions Emilia Doran’s desire should’ve watched her walk the 17^th hole of Pinehurst No. 2 on Thursday morning.

The pace might’ve rivaled the one Bryson DeChambeau set here not two years ago, but 14 years ago.

In the opening match of the Round of 32 of the 124^th Women’s North & South Amateur, Doran, the 2022 champion of this event, was clinging to a 2-up lead, though with only two to play. But anyone who had been following the match against the 32^nd-seeded Jillian Fatkin could feel the match slipping away.

Especially with Fatkin safely on the left side of the green and Doran in the deep far-right bunker after her second poor par-3 tee shot in the last three holes.

Doran had played second on the tee – as she had the entire back nine since losing the 10^th hole, and then the 12^th to cut her 4-up lead at the turn in half. But as the group descended the hill of the 152-yard 17th, Doran strode past all of them. Her legs churning against burgeoning North Carolina heat and her boiling frustration, Doran glided past everyone on her own direct path off and to the right of everyone else. She got to her ball before anyone else in the group or following it settled.

She stepped down into the bunker and stood behind the ball with her hands on her hips.

And glared.

“There’s nothing like competitive golf,” Doran says later. “I had so much adrenaline the last 12 holes. Just trying to close out a match is the most thrilling, nerve-wracking…it’s everything. You’re trying to channel every single positive energy possible.

“It was so fun.”

Fun? This is fun?

“There’s nothing like the adrenaline when you hit a good shot,” she says, smiling.

But what about after a bad shot? What about when your lead is slipping away, and your opponent drills a 30-foot putt for birdie on 17 to send you to 18? And she has three birdies on the back nine of No. 2 and then blasts a drive up the right side of the fairway? What about then?

“Broadcasting helps with that,” Doran says with a laugh. “Fortunately, I see a lot of bad shots when players win. And I know every time I step up over the ball, I know I can hit a good shot.”

Plenty has been written and talked about Emilia Doran. A star college and amateur golfer with Wake Forest – among many other achievements, Doran (then Emilia Migliaccio before marrying) was a Curtis Cup player and an Augusta National Women’s Amateur Runner-Up. And, yes, she won the Women’s North & South here four years ago.

But after graduating from Wake Forest, Doran decided against turning professional and taking her game to the LPGA Tour. She’s kept her amateur status and remains active enough. Among her recent highlights was reaching the Round of 32 match play of the U.S. Women’s Amateur at Bandon Dunes a year ago – an event that she both played and, as a full-time Golf Channel broadcaster, worked. The 27-year-old was named the Carolinas Golf Association’s Women’s Player of the Year in 2025, a year in which she also reached the quarterfinals of the U.S. Women’s Mid-Am and won the Donna Andrews Invitational.

So, when Doran walked up to her ball on the 18^th tee and blasted a pressure-filled drive down the middle of the fairway and made a routine par to finally finish off the match, there wasn’t relief in her body.

Instead, it was the same sense of satisfaction she’s always felt.

“I know my expectations don’t change,” she says. “I’m expecting the same out of myself that I always did.”

“It comes in waves,” she adds about when she does try to grind through working at golf. “I’ve probably played four times in the last month before coming here. And I’d practice 6-to-8 hours a day when I was playing competitively the way I did before. But I bring my clubs on work trips and if I can get two 30-minute practices in, that’s pretty good. It’s definitely difficult to play, but I’ll come home from a Red Eye and I’ll putt in the afternoon. And that’s because I know this stuff still means something to me. Golf is priority No. 5, but I want to practice to fullest of priority No. 5.”

It’s certainly working again in Pinehurst. Doran shot rounds of 70 both on No. 2 and No. 4 in stroke play, winning medalist honors for…the first time anywhere? Could that be?

“My goal was to make it to match play, and I knew I could do it,” she says. “I was just really proud of myself that those two rounds led to a top seed. I was pretty overwhelmed with gratitude. And I don’t think I’ve ever even been a medalist. Maybe at the Western Junior once, but that was…maybe 2014?”

Certainly, times have changed for Doran. But what hasn’t – other than being in contention in Pinehurst – is that Doran still yearns for the feelings that come with not only the good shots, but the great struggles as well. She still burns with passion for the game, and just because it’s at the amateur level doesn’t mean it’s anything less than what it would be anywhere else.

“It’s honestly not that much different,” she says, thinking back to who she was here in 2022 versus now. “Yeah, I have perspective, but it’s not like I’m just going out there to have fun. It’s not like I’m not nervous because I’m not playing for a ranking or to be recruited. I’m out there equally to win. Yeah, maybe I have a bigger picture of things, but in the moment? Nothing is different.”

What is different is what people might say, or think. Watch her play and you can see the game is good enough for a career on the LPGA Tour. Before Doran made the decision to forego a pursuit of professional golf, the most likely trajectory was always to leave amateur golf and try to earn your card and make a career on Tour. Many of the past champions of the Women’s North & South have done that.

But that’s just not what Doran wanted.

“I don’t know that any broadcaster or journalist has asked me this, but I think people think I didn’t play professional golf because of the pressure. Like, ‘Oh, it’s so nice you don’t have to deal with the pressure.’ Or, ‘You can just go out and have fun.’ And that is not why I didn’t turn pro. I mean, I love the pressure. I wouldn’t be able to compete if I didn’t like it.

“That’s probably a question that’s maybe misinterpreted for why I didn’t turn pro. The lifestyle and what it takes to be the best player on the LPGA Tour is just not the lifestyle I wanted. I can still compete on an amateur level, and I’m not craving to see how my game stacks up against Nelly Korda.

“I know how it’s going to stack up.

“She’s better than me.”