Brooke Brezovski scored a hole in one as the 2018 recipient of the Helena Harbridge Award.
Brezovski, 15, was acknowledged by the Canadian Junior Golf Association as exemplifying the same characteristics as Harbridge – a CJGA alumna from Etobicoke, Ont., who died in April 2006 at the age 18 during her freshman year with the West Georgia University Wolves – exhibited on and off the course and those traits were sportsmanship, dedication and contributions to the game of golf.
“It’s a national award and there is a lot of great girl golfers I compete against so to be recognized for this award means a lot,” said Brezovski, a member of the Sturgeon Valley Golf & Country Club.
Harbridge was the first woman to win a golf tournament for the Wolves and led the team to three victories in its first season.
The 2004 CJGA Order of Merit winner was on pace to become an Academic All-American with the Wolves when she died in her sleep of a suspected heart arrhythmia.
Brezovski is the 13th Canadian female junior golfer to be honoured by the CJGA with the award and previous beneficiaries from Alberta were Juanita Rico (2007), Jocelyn Alford (2008) and Bria Jansen (2014).
Award winners receive a trophy and lifetime CJGA membership.
Brezovski was unaware the award existed until a text from a CJGA official last week broke the news.
“I looked her up. I didn’t really see any pictures, but they had some things about her and this award,” said the Grade 10 St. Albert Catholic High School student. “They said she had sportsmanship, dedication, honesty and integrity.”
The latest accomplishment for Brezovski symbolized a memorable season on the links that included a repeat performance as the ladies’ club champion at Sturgeon Valley with rounds of 80 and 82 for the four-stroke victory at 162 in a field of 23.
“I got to represent Alberta in the Montana Ryder Cup this summer so that was a real big highlight just being invited to that,” said one of the six Team Alberta females at the 27th annual Alberta-Montana Junior Ryder Cup, a two-day, 36-hole match play tournament at Whitefish Lake Golf Club.
“We had the PGA Alberta Junior Masters (in May at Wolf Creek Golf Resort) and I shot my best score of 74 on the second day so that was a big highlight for me. It was a really good round,” said the fourth-place finisher in the tournament’s U14 division.
Brezovski also competed in the Alberta Junior & Juvenile Championships and shot rounds of 79-78-78 to finish tied for ninth out of 26 females at the Coyote Creek course in Sundre.
“It was a pretty good summer. I had a couple of tournaments where I wished I would’ve done a little bit better in, but it was pretty good. I improved a lot this summer,” said the runner-up at the CJGA junior tournament at Boulder Creek Golf Course in Langdon at 161 (82-79) in the U19 division.
However, Brezovski is still haunted by an unusually high round by her standards.
“There was a Future Links tournament (at Highwood Golf & Country Club) and I shot really good on one of the days, a 76 (after an 87 on day one), and then the next day it just wasn’t going for me and I shot 93 and it just kind of sucked to shoot such a good score and the next day it kind of went away like that,” said the co-U18 female winner at the Edmonton Golf Association Junior Championship at 166 (80-86) at the Edmonton Petroleum Golf & Country Club.
In September, Brezovski placed fourth out of 69 females at the Alberta Schools’ Athletic Association provincial golf championships with a 156 (76 at Springbank Links Golf Course and 80 at River Spirit Golf Course).
“All my competitors that I golf against during the summer were there and it was super fun," said the only St. Albert high school female at provincials with a qualifying round of 82 at the Stony Plain Golf Course and it was the third-best score at the Edmonton zones.
Earlier in the month, Brezovski posted a third-place total of 158 (76-82) in the U19 division at the CJGA Alberta Fall Series tournament at Sturgeon Valley and the result landed her a spot with the CJGA Team Canada contingent for the Aaron Baddeley Junior International Championship last month in California.
“It was really cool to get invited because it's something you have to qualify for so there were three girls and six guys and it was more like a team event," said Brezovski, who was joined by Jenna Bruggeman of Edmonton and Hunter Nugent of Ontario.
The Canadian teams played against representation from Australia, Japan, Mexico and the United States at the La Costa Golf Club, located north of San Diego in Carlsbad. The Canadian females finished sixth out of eight teams and Brezovski’s scores were 90-92-84-87 for 28th overall.
“Some of the winter rust was on obviously because this was a more recent tournament after the snow had fallen here,” Brezovski said. “The yardage was pretty long, around 6,000 yards, so it was a good challenge for my yardage. I played not bad for having the winter rust and the long yardage.”
Leading up to another busy summer golf tour schedule for Brezovski is a tournament in March in Vancouver.
“I’m going to try and go for more Golf Canada and Golf Alberta events, those bigger ones,” said Brezovski, noting junior nationals is high on the priority list after missing the cut at 181 (92-89) at last year’s championship at Beach Grove Golf Club in Tsawwassen, B.C.
“A big goal of mine for this summer is to make the cut for that. It was pretty hard (last year). I didn’t have my best round so I wasn’t that close to making the cut.”
