PEBBLE BEACH – In August 2004, Mina Harigae sat down for an interview with The Monterey Herald. Then 14 years old, the Monterey native – who’s now halfway through her 13th season on the LPGA Tour – reflected on her golfing career.

“Next year I want to win the U.S. Junior,” she said, just ahead of starting her freshman year at Stevenson School in Pebble Beach. “That is my goal. And make the U.S. Women’s Amateur quarterfinals. (I) want to win at least one (American Junior Golf Association) event, or junior nationals. Later on I want to go pro. College? Maybe I’ll go one year or two.”

It wasn’t an exact premonition, but her aspirations were hardly unrealistic.

Harigae has been golfing professionally since 2009, making her one of the few players – male or female – to come off the Peninsula and make it at the pro level. Though the 33-year-old has never won on the LPGA Tour, she’s repeatedly fought her way into the mix with the sport’s top women, especially in the past three years.

Enjoying a career resurgence, Harigae recorded eight of career 20 top-10 finishes and four of her career top-fives in 2020 and 2021. And last year, she finally played her way to a fourth-round leader pairing at a major, ultimately leaving as runner-up of the 2022 U.S. Women’s Open. A career best, she took home just over $1 million, the largest purse for second place in a women’s event. Better yet, it meant Harigae was one of a handful top finishers exempt into the 2023 championship.

That’s a sweet deal for any member of the LPGA Tour. But for Harigae, it was a uniquely personal prize. She was headed home, with the next U.S. Women’s Open – now just days away – slated for the Pebble Beach Golf Links, a course not more than 15 minutes from where she grew up.

“It’s really special,” Harigae told The Herald last week, “for me to play right in (my) backyard.”

It’s a homecoming that, even in 2004, seemed almost fated.

“Have you ever played Pebble Beach?” former Herald golf writer Ed Vyeda asked Harigae nearly two decades ago. “What did you think?”

“Twice,” Harigae told him then. She has since clocked in at least 50 more visits to the course since. “I love it. It’s next to the ocean.”

Early days in Del Rey Oaks

Harigae has had a club in her hand for the better part of 25 years. At 8 years old, her mom enrolled her in a junior golf clinic through the Salvation Army.

“I needed something to do after school,” Hargiae explained. “That’s literally the only reason. … My dad played golf, and I’d go with him when he played on the weekends. (But then) my mom found a junior golf clinic … on the weekdays. She would drop me off.”

It was a natural fit.

“It sounds weird, but I don’t remember ever really being bad at it,” she laughed. “I think if I was, I wouldn’t have stuck with it. Or maybe, I just enjoyed it so much, I didn’t really care.”

Hargiae soon found herself practicing at a local driving range. That’s when Nick Nelson noticed her.

She was out hitting balls, with her mom by her side, at what used to be the Del Rey Oaks Golf Center on Rosita Road. Nelson, then a golf coach but today CEO of First Tee Monterey County, took note of Harigae’s swing, he recalled recently.

“I approached her mom and asked who she was taking lessons with because she had such a great golf swing,” Nelson said. “Her mom said she wasn’t taking lessons with anyone. She was just going to the Salvation Army.”

A former pro-turned golf teacher with a long pedigree of mentoring youth golfers, Nelson offered to be Harigae’s coach – but only if she wanted. Harigae agreed, and they were off.

The pair worked together every week for almost four years. Though early in the grand scheme of Harigae’s golfing career, Nelson said her potential – and talent – was undeniable, even then.

“I’ve been teaching golf since I was 16. That’s almost 50 years. In that time, I’ve worked with hundreds, if not thousands of budding youth golfers, and I’ve only ever seen two who stood out to me above everyone else,” Nelson said. “One was a young man in England who had no interest in the game. And the second was Mina.”

Gifted, yes. But what stood out to Nelson when he watched young Harigae play was her poise and attitude.

“Nothing seemed to bother her on the golf course,” he said. “It would be a nationally ranked event on the Peninsula, and she’d be in a playoff with someone who was five years older than her, and she wouldn’t bat an eyelid. In my opinion, that’s the difference between good players and great players: mental toughness.”

It’s the kind of tenacity that led Harigae to an epochal introduction to competitive golf when she was just a sixth grader.

State Am championship

In the 57-year history of the California Women’s Amateur Championship, an annual tournament for the state’s top female amateur golfers, there have been three four-time winners: Shelley Hamlin, who took home four straight wins from 1967-1970; Lynne Cowan, now a Northern California Golf Association Hall of Famer who won twice 1999-2000, and again in 2005 and 2007; and Hargiae, who took home the title a total a four times, consecutively, from 2001-2004.

She won her first State Am at 12, securing the first-place finish after four rounds of match play at Carmel’s Quail Lodge & Golf Course. The win made Harigae one of the youngest U.S. state amateur champions ever. It was also the moment Harigae knew she wanted to be a professional golfer.

“That tournament was when I knew (golf) is what I wanted to do – that I wanted to be an LPGA player,” Harigae said, adding that she “just enjoyed competing so much, I think that’s why.”

“It was the thrill,” she continued. “I was thrilled to be playing against others and to advance and just compete in general. I’ve always been that way, especially when I was a junior golfer. I wouldn’t play in too many tournaments … but anytime I did, I would look forward to it so much.”

Harigae’s State Am debut launched her onto the national golfing stage almost immediately. In January 2002, Golf Digest named Harigae one of the “top 100 newsmakers of 2001.” Later that year, Harigae was featured in Sports Illustrated. Locally, former Herald golf writer Jerry Stewart dubbed her a “pint-sized par machine.”

“What was very impressive with her, even back then, is that she was always so steady,” Stewart recalled. “She didn’t ever make a mistake. She was extremely accurate, especially around the greens. …There have been some great players to come out of the Peninsula, but certainly for the modern era, Mina is number one among them.”

For an area lauded as a golf mecca of sorts, that’s high praise. But to those in the local golfing community, Harigae stood out – they knew she was someone worth investing in.

“I mean, all the (local) courses I used to practice at, they were all so nice to me,” Harigae said. “They’d slip me range tokens here and there. Or, if I was playing late, they’d just tell me to go ahead. … They were always so supportive, and they didn’t need to be. I was just a kid.”

Stevenson School

By the time she started her freshman year at Stevenson, the private high school just a short distance away from the Pebble Beach Golf Links, Harigae had three State Am titles to her name. She was ranked among the top junior golfers in the country and wasn’t going quietly in national competitions. She was certainly a welcomed addition to Stevenson’s roster of players.

“Mina possessed a certain type of tenacity and work ethic that only a few kids had,” former Stevenson girls’ golf team coach David Vivolo said in an email. “She practiced very hard and I could see that she was smart about how she practiced and what she was practicing on.”

Harigae was on Vivolo’s radar long before she got to high school. Really, since “she was a little girl,” he said, explaining that she and his oldest son used to play together from time to time. Again, he noticed what other early mentors of Harigae’s saw: unyielding drive, on and off the greens.

Vivolo remembered, in Harigae’s senior year, she and the rest of the girls’ golf team were favorites to win at the high school state championships. They fared well but missed a win by one shot.

“I remember Mina not having her best day but was still encouraging and loving to all the other girls,” he said.

“I think for me, it’s a lot easier to be positive and encouraging to others,” Harigae said, recalling that particular tournament. “I’m very, very hard on myself. …But for others (and on that team), it was way easier to say, ‘Hey, golf is hard. Don’t worry about it.’ But with me I’m like, ‘how could you do that?’”

Outside of Stevenson, Harigae’s accolades mounted. She racked up one more State Am win in 2004 and by June 2007, had won the U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links, her first national title. That same summer, 17-year-old Harigae competed in her first U.S. Women’s Open, where she was one of four amateurs to make the cut.

Harigae graduated from Stevenson in 2008. Soon enough, she’d be off to play golf for Duke University in North Carolina, briefly, before going pro. For the foreseeable future, it was goodbye to the Peninsula for Harigae, barring the occasional local tournament like the TaylorMade Pebble Beach Invitational or visits to her parents, who still live in town, as well as own and operate Takara Sushi in Pacific Grove.

In turn, for the local golfing community, it was the end of an era. In fact, in 2008, the Peninsula was sending off not just one, but two hometown heroines.

Sydney Burlison

Where there was Harigae, there was Sydney Burlison. Born two weeks and a few towns apart, the pair circulated in the same sphere of junior golf for the better part of a decade. From Salinas, Burlison burst onto the competitive golfing scene right alongside Harigae at the 2001 State Am, finishing in second place. They posted a similar 1-2 finish the following year. They were fierce rivals – and fast friends.

Harigae and Burlison met when they were 11, at the old Del Rey Oaks driving range, where they were both students of Nelson’s. Forming a bond in a usually solitary sport, they became close. And not just for the cameras or the media because it made a good story, but the kind of kinship two young girls growing up and going through a unique experience together never really seem to lose.

“It’s funny because when people hear about us, you know, being friends, they think that we’re exaggerating,” Burlison said with a laugh over the phone recently. “But we really are. We’re always texting. There’s non-stop chatter when we’re together. We genuinely are still really close, which is nice.”

“Our friendship has always been this one where… anytime we link up, we’re the same,” Harigae said. “I’ll always be there for her, and she’ll always be there for me.”

Though Burlison no longer competes, through her junior years, like Harigae, she excelled. She won four American Junior Golf Association All-American titles, qualified for the 2003 U.S. Women’s Open when she was 13 and won the Pro-Junior title at the 2008 First Tee Open in Pebble Beach.

After graduating from Stevenson with Harigae, Burlison eventually went on to play for Stanford University. But the goal of going pro eventually fell away to other interests. Harigae, though, was built to go pro, Burlison said.

“Never once could you count Mina out,” Burlison said. “No matter if she had a bad hole, she was scrappy at draining a really long putt. I never felt like I ever let my guard down when I was competing with her. Not that you should ever let your guard down, but especially with her. She rises to the occasion. … Mina was always 100% going pro. It was when, not if with her.”

Still, for as long as Burlison stuck around the sport, she credits the competition – and companionship – with Harigae.

“I can’t speak for her, but I know for me, Mina played a big role in how far I went with competitive golf,” Burlison said. “At times, it got intense. But we were always friends off the golf course. … I know some girls that competed and were the best in their areas but didn’t have anyone to go through that process with and they burned out or lost interest. I didn’t, because I had my best childhood friend with me. It was a great thing.”

The feeling is mutual.

“Honestly, if I hadn’t met Sydney, I don’t think I’d be here,” Harigae said. ‘To have a girl that I could play golf with and compete with, it was the best. … I mean, you could just feed off each other. And you had this other person that knew what you were going through.”

While they diverged post-high school, Harigae and Burlison’s relationship has remained strong – even more so these days, thanks to this year’s U.S. Women’s Open, of all things. Playing a part in the championship herself, Burlison is the director of U.S. Open Partnerships for the Pebble Beach Company. The role, which Burlison has had for the past two years, once again pushed her and Harigae into the same line of work. Sometimes, at the very same event.

In 2021, just after she took the job at Pebble, Burlison had the chance to see Harigae compete in person for the first time in years.

“I was watching her on the first tee, and I was struggling not to cry. I was so proud of her,” Burlison said. “And she, of course, hit it right down the middle. … I was sweating (for her). But her ball went right where she needed it. I should have known that it was going to. It’s Mina.”

Burlison’s hoping she gets time to do the same during this week’s Open, she said, remarking how surreal the occasion is when she thinks back to how far she and Harigae have come together.

“I used to putt on the practice green at Pebble. My dad would drop the ball and say I could only leave if I made the putt under pressure. He’d say ‘10 feet for the U.S. Open,’” Burlison said. “It was abstract at the time. I never thought it would really be the U.S. (Women’s) Open here where there will literally be someone putting for (the title).” Maybe even her oldest friend.

“I’m excited to see where (Mina) lands,” Burlison continued. “This whole thing is just fun for the two of us. And she has the capability to win for sure.”

It would certainly be a satisfying victory and a testament to what it took to follow a long 12-plus years on the LPGA Tour to home.

Going pro, staying there

When Harigae first heard that the U.S. Women’s Open would be coming to Pebble Beach nearly six years ago – a historic addition for the 104-year-old course – she was excited. But the announcement came with a caveat: she had to keep her spot on the LPGA Tour to see the opportunity through. For the then eight-year tour veteran, the prospect of playing a major at Pebble was a challenge to stay competitive.

“I don’t think I was playing very well at the time,” Harigae said. “It basically kicked me into gear.”

Harigae turned pro at 19 years old. Leaving Duke after one semester, she joined the Futures Tour, the LPGA’s feeder circuit (now known as the Epson Tour). She posted three victories on the developmental tour, before moving on to the big leagues in 2010. From an amateur career for the books to a successful ramp-up season, Harigae had more than enough momentum going into the LPGA Tour for triumph. But her rookie year, she faltered. Through her first eight tournaments, Harigae missed the cut four times. Her best finish that inaugural season was eighth.

“I was a small fish in a big pond,” Harigae told the USGA earlier this year for its quarterly-printed Golf Journal. “There were so many girls I had never heard of from other countries, and everyone can play. It was a shock to the system.”

By Harigae’s fifth season, it seemed like she was starting to find a groove. In 2013, she had four top-10 finishes. And the following year, her earnings climbed to $324,439.

But Harigae’s career stalled. In 2016, she earned a meager $46,508. Posting another disappointing 2017 season, Harigae tried to re-evaluate her game, just as news broke of the U.S. Women’s Open going local. Still, it wasn’t enough. In 2019, Harigae faced a summer of seven straight missed cuts. The less-than-stellar run left her with only a conditional status for the LPGA Tour’s 2020 season, meaning her participation in every Tour event wasn’t guaranteed.

With an added factor of having little Tour money to show from years of scant payouts, Harigae considered leaving competitive golf to become a club pro. But with encouragement from her mom – who reminded her that as a professional golfer, she’s going to make money doing just that, Harigae told Golf Digest in 2021 – she got to work.

“I think when your back is up against the wall and you hit rock bottom, the easiest thing you can do is start over. I had to make a drastic change,” Harigae said.

After securing her Tour card through LPGA qualifying school – basically pro limbo – Harigae overhauled her technique. She altered her swing and changed the way she putted. She reworked her mental game, too, enlisting mental performance coach Dawn Woodward for help.

“One of the things we worked on was accepting my not-so-great feelings,” Harigae said. “(And) recognizing that it was OK  to be nervous and OK to feel those negative emotions.”

But there was something else Harigae had to do to get back to her old self: realize why she wanted to go pro to begin with.

To compete.

“I remember it was just when COVID hit and the LPGA put on an exhibition match at the golf club that I’m a member of (for) money,” Harigae said. “One of the girls (there) blistered us. She was thanking everyone, and I remember her saying that she just loves to compete. She said she could play for a million dollars or just for dinner, and she would love it the same. Because she just loves the feeling of competing.

“I remember thinking that I hadn’t had that feeling for years. It’s always been about playing well enough to afford it and not about the spirit of competition. Something just clicked in me.”

That’s when Harigae hit her stride. While the LPGA Tour paused for the pandemic, she found success on the second-tier Cactus Tour, winning four of five events and a total of $2,500. By the time the LPGA resumed, she was in peak performance. In 2021, she made 18 cuts out of 21 events, earning nearly $800,000 for the season. Harigae was also tapped as a captain’s pick for the U.S. Solheim Cup Team, a biennial tournament featuring top women golfers from only the United States and Europe.

Then Harigae placed second at last year’s U.S. Women’s Open.

“I had that mindset of just wanting to beat everyone,” Harigae said. “I wanted to compete. That really helped propel me forward.”

Now the question is, will the momentum carry?

Full circle

This season Harigae has made the cut at seven of 12 events. Her highest finish for 2023 was a tie for 24th at the last tournament before this week’s Open – the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship in New Jersey (she was tied for eighth going into the final round). The weekend before, Harigae posted T29 at the Meijer LPGA Classic in Michigan. Not chart-topping, but Harigae says she feels like pieces are falling into place, just in time for Pebble.

“You know, I’ve been doing a lot of the right things,” she said. “It didn’t really quite come together, but then in the last couple of weeks, I think I’m playing more like myself again. … Like I said, I’m not playing terribly. (At KPMG), I think I played about 70 holes of great golf. But I think things weren’t really all coming together, until now. I’m happy where I am.”

There’s the added benefit that Harigae knows the ins and outs of the Pebble Beach Golf Links well. Though USGA has altered the course for the Open, Harigae says she has a sense for “where the best place to be and the worst place to be is on each hole,” adding that the course knowledge is a “nice advantage” because she doesn’t have to learn on the fly. She’s played Pebble as recently as this spring, with her husband, Travis Kreiter (who is also her longtime caddie). Last summer, too, with Burlison.

Still, dogged as ever, Harigae said, “At the end of the day, I have to hit it where I need to hit it, no matter what course it is.”

For that, it’s about keeping a sound mindset, especially with all eyes on her homecoming. But Harigae has been readying herself for the expected whirlwind.

“I know it’s going to be a little crazy, especially off the golf course… (but) I know what’s coming,” she said. “I just have to keep cool and level-headed and treat it like any other golf tournament. Well, not any other golf tournament. I’m just going to try to not to put more emphasis on it than usual and just enjoy the atmosphere.”

“I think honestly,” she continued, “if I can get through the week without feeling overwhelmed or letting the pressure get to me, that’s my goal. If I can just really enjoy every single day that I’m there, I’d be thrilled.”

Playing Pebble, it would be hard not to, a lesson Harigae has known since she was a junior.

“I can’t wait to walk Pebble Beach every day,” she said. “What’s better than that?”