Westfall family

Kaylee Westfall has been taking on her brothers and her father since she was just about 11 years old, so taking on the state’s best high school golfers was taken in stride.

Westfall won the 4A Girls Golf Championship on Thursday as the only under-par golfer in the competition and a full seven strokes ahead of the second-place finisher. The competition was held at Southgate Golf Club in St. George, a course Westfall prepared for well and then executed even better, carding scores of 69 and 67 over the two day event.

Using her superior accuracy and putting stroke, Westfall finished out both rounds in style, birding the Par 5 17th and then eagling the Par 5 18th on consecutive days.

“I definitely went in confident that I could win it,” Westfall said. “I put in a ton of work and effort and it really paid off for me in the tournament. I’m so grateful for everyone who helped me get there.”

Kaylee Westfall’s work began at the young age of 11 years old after finally agreeing to pick up a golf club after multiple urges from her father, Heath Westfall. She finally decided to accept those invitations due to simply wanting to spend time with her father, fearful that he may just quit asking after a while.

Westfall family

As is the case with most first-time golfers, swinging a golf club effectively didn’t come easy for Kaylee, although she wanted to stick with it.

“I really did fall in love with the game after figuring out how to hit the ball well,” she said. “I was so bad when I started, but my dad made me stick with it, as did my mother, who always told me that, ‘competence builds confidence,’ and that’s always stuck with me.”

Through multiple sessions with her father, and others, Kaylee’s game started to round into form.

“I had to work really hard and go out there many days when I really didn’t want to,” she related. “But it started to come around and I started to become confident in what I was doing and just started to get better and better to the point where I absolutely fell in love with the game.”

Kaylee’s family is right with her with regards to loving the game of golf. Her mother, Rebecca, eventually took to the game, too, largely due to wanting to engage in a fun activity with the rest of the Westfall family, which includes her older brother, Austin (18 years old), her younger brother, Dade (15) and her sister, Brooklyn (13.)

Westfall family

All six of them can be found frequently at Riverside Country Club where they play with and compete against one another.

So is Kaylee to the point where she can beat her brothers on the golf course?

“Oh yeah, I can definitely get them out there,” she said. “We have a lot of fun competing against each other, and it’s always a great competition. It depends on the day, and they’re both really good, but I can definitely beat them.”

It wasn’t long until Kaylee began competing with others outside of her family, notably with Orem High School, where her coaches, Reggie Rhees and then Nick Parmley, both welcomed not only her fantastic golf game, but her general presence on the team.

“She comes from a great family that instilled great values that she’s really adhered to,” Parmley said. “She’s been a great role model for our entire team with how she just treats people annd how she works with them. She’s just a great person and she’s an absolute pleasure to coach.”

The team aspect of high school golf is an aspect Kaylee takes great satisfaction with.

“I love my team so much,” she said. “I love every single one of them and all of them have come a really, really long way. We’re all so supportive of each other. We won region, so I was really happy with that because we’ve all worked so hard together.”

“Kaylee puts in the work for herself, but she also works hard in helping everyone else on the team,” Parmley added. “She’s not a procrastinator. She knows what needs to be done and just does it. So she’s a great example to everyone on our team. She lifts everyone just with her presence and with how she goes about things. She’s a natural leader.”

She looked every bit the natural throughout the 4A championship, having scouted out and practiced on the Southgate Golf Club course intently and then manage what the course gave her throughout the two day competition.

“I had a lot of tap-in pars and I was just really consistent throughout,” Kaylee said. “It was disappointing that I didn’t have more birdies drop, but the course just wasn’t giving it to you, so I just tried to manage that the best I could. But then I was able to make birdie and eagle on the last two holes both days, so the patience worked out well.”

Only a junior, Kaylee hopes to repeat as state champion next year while hoping to attract more attention at the collegiate level.

“I definitely want to golf in college, and that’s a big goal of mine right now,” she said. “I’ve heard from different schools, mostly local colleges, which is great because I want to stay in state. I’m just so blessed for all of it. I’ve had amazing coaches and my family has helped so much with everything. I’m just hoping to continue to work hard and we’ll see what happens. I’m excited for all of it.”