CHASKA, Minn. — Ina Yoon has been nearly indestructible this week. Her nine-under 63 on Thursday matched the lowest score in the history of the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. She came out on Friday and made four more front-nine birdies and shot 69.
She finally came back down to Earth on Saturday (six bogeys to three birdies to shoot 75), but she’s still in prime position with 18 holes remaining in the LPGA’s third major of the season — and one great round away from claiming her first major championship.
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Pressure? She said she felt it on Saturday. Although Yoon’s path to this point is unlike that of any of her peers.
Four years ago, Yoon, now a 23-year-old South Korean pro, was suspended from the Korean Golf Association and KLPGA for a cheating scandal.
There had been few details about the suspension, although Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols interviewed Yoon via an interpreter earlier this year and learned more. As a 19-year-old rookie playing in the first round of the 2022 Korea Women’s Open, Yoon’s drive missed a fairway, and her playing partners helped her find her ball. She played it, only to realize at the green that it was the wrong ball, but she never told anyone.
“I wasn’t sure what to do because this had never happened to me, so I was a bit frazzled,” Yoon told Golfweek. “My caddie said to hit it. I shouldn’t have listened, but I did. I should have reported it right away, but I was really nervous and scared about that. I missed the cut, and I thought it would be OK. The people around me told me that it shouldn’t be too much of an issue, so I listened.”
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A month later at a different tournament — the KLPGA’s Evercollagen Queens Crown, which she eventually won — Yoon was accused of the rules violation and admitted to it a day later.
The KLPGA’s Reward and Punishment Subcommittee took swift action, suspending her for three years. In a statement, the committee said, “We will continue to deal sternly with similar incidents.”
Yoon told Golfweek that while she didn’t break the rules with “malicious intent,” she accepted the ban for her mistake.
Through appeals, the ban was eventually cut in half to 18 months. During the suspension, Yoon moved to Tampa, Fla., played as the only woman on the Minor League Golf Tour, and donated all of her winnings to junior golf programs.
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She returned to the KLPGA in 2024 and earned her LPGA membership for 2025 via the LPGA Q-Series.
Last year, as a rookie, she made 18 of 26 cuts with one top-10 finish, but she’s taken another step this season. She’s missed just one cut in 11 starts and recorded four top-10 finishes, and she even threatened to win the first major of the season, the Chevron Championship, before tying for fourth.
Now she has her next best chance at a major title. She led the KPMG Women’s PGA after the first and second rounds, but after her 75 on Saturday, she’s now nine under and in third place. Haeran Ryu leads at 11 under, with Brooke Henderson in second place at 10 under. Alison Lee and Nelly Korda are both tied at seven under, four off the lead.
“[Today] was my first time and experience having such a lead, so I expected to be nervous,” Yoon said after her round Saturday. “Despite that, I think I was able to keep my calm relatively well, and playing through nerves was the lesson I really learned today.”
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Yoon, Riu and Henderson make up the final threesome. They’ll tee off at 10:25 a.m. ET on Sunday.
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