ERIN, Wis. — After a terrifying 24 hours, Amari Avery was safe in a hotel and her misplaced golf clubs were the least of her concerns.
She, her boyfriend and her parents dealt with a man trying to break into her rented house in Milwaukee in the middle of the night on Friday. They waited for the police to arrive but the burglar had left by then.
What a week at the U.S. Women’s Open, one she’ll never forget.
“It was just scary, like a bit of a panic at first, obviously,” Avery, 20, recounted. “My dad came in the room and my boyfriend got scared first, so I just thought it was someone that was in the room. I couldn’t tell it was my dad. He told us that someone was downstairs and we needed to wake up just in case we had to get running.
“Yeah, it was just a scary time. We were trying to figure out what to do. We called the police. It took them 15, 20 minutes to get to the house, so it was just kind of scary waiting there. My boyfriend, my mom, and my dad saw the person outside the door, so it was a little bit scary. We just kind of stayed back away from the front door and we were just kind of hoping it would solve itself, which it was nice that the guy ended up leaving and the police came and made us feel more safe.”
That happened in the wee hours Friday, before Avery was set to play the second round at Erin Hills Golf Course after a nice opening one-under 71. Thankfully Avery, a former USC golfer, and her family were OK.
Looks like Amari Avery has her golf ⛳️ clubs back @usc https://t.co/Xso0XX2B50 pic.twitter.com/EkXlqh55Ki
— Jill Painter Lopez (@jillpainter) May 31, 2025
The Averys found a hotel, and in the scramble of getting clothes and clubs together, her golf bag was misplaced. Her boyfriend, Gavin Aurilia, accidentally took her golf clubs instead of his when he traveled back to Los Angeles. They both have USC travel bags.
“I’ve seen some of the comments. We don’t buy similar travel bags. We use the same one from USC, so it’s obviously the exact same, it looks the exact same,” Avery said. “I think it’s equally my dad and my boyfriend’s fault for not checking the bags. But they loaded it in the car, my dad took him to the airport, and he grabbed the wrong set. That was that, and we actually didn’t realize until about like 12:15 before my (2:31 p.m.) tee time. So it was a little bit of a scramble. We tried to figure it out.”
She played with Gabriela Ruffels’ clubs on Friday after making calls to TaylorMade, her agent and others to get replacement clubs. By the time she got to the range, she had several options.
“It was a scramble in the afternoon just to figure out if I was even going to play. I sat in my hotel at 12:30 and was like ‘I guess I am going to pull out from the U.S. Open after a pretty solid round.’ I was obviously devastated,” she said.
“But finally getting Gabi’s clubs, I had like three sets of clubs on the range. Obviously the USGA helped me out so much, so it was nice. I tried out some of the clubs and I figured Gabi’s was the best way to go. We don’t share any clubs at all. Luckily, it’s the same brand and I’m very used to hitting all types of clubs when I do fittings and stuff like that. It was nice that it was able to work.”
Perhaps the chaotic day understandably caught up with her by Saturday. After Avery made the cut—shooting 73 with the borrowed clubs—she shot a four-over 76 in the third round with her own clubs, which Gavin’s mother, Raquel, brought back as soon as she received a call from Avery.
Patrick McDermott
On Saturday, she started on No. 10, then she nearly aced the par-3, 189-yard sixth hole. Her ball hit the green, rolled up, ricocheted off the flagstick and stopped a couple of feet away. The irons worked well most of the day, but it was the putter that let Avery down, leaving her to joke that she wouldn’t have minded keeping Ruffels’.
“It was nice to have my clubs back in the bag and just be with something I’m more familiar with,” said Avery, who is tied for 41st place. “Honestly, based on the score and just based on how I felt [Friday], I felt like Gabi’s clubs were honestly pretty good. I joked with her last night after I called her and I said: ‘obviously, thank you so much for lending me the clubs. I was like, I might take your putter.’
“I love my putter, like everyone knows that. But I don’t know, my college coach said I gained putts yesterday. Maybe I should take her putter and maybe like an iron or two. But no, it was nice to have my clubs back.”
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
