Maya Lilja-Vazquez admitted to being nervous as she stepped to the No. 17 tee box at Pebble Beach Golf Links, one of the sport’s most iconic and beloved courses.
First Tee-Savannah golfer/Savannah Arts Academy junior Maya Lilja-Vazquez poses at Pebble Beach Golf Links during the PURE Insurance Championship. Photo courtesy of Scott Lilja.
The Savannah teenager wasn’t anxious because she was playing on television as part of a PGA Tour Champions event, the 2026 PURE Insurance Championship Impacting First Tee. Neither was she intimidated by playing with her partner, tour pro Gary Hallberg, nor by the famed California course and the gallery in general.
But three girls, standing outside the ropes, got to her. The spectators called out, “Can we get your autograph?” as the group of Hallberg, Lilja-Vazquez and two adult male amateurs approached the par-3 No. 17.
“My pro and my amateurs, they thought they were talking to them,” Lilja-Vazquez recalled. "The little girls were like, ‘No, we actually want her autograph.’ It was a really sweet moment. I went up to them. I asked them, ‘You want pink or black Sharpie?’ I wrote my name on their little flags. It was really special.”
It was probably the first autograph request of her life, said Lilja-Vazquez, who had turned 17 earlier in the month of the Sept. 18-20 tournament.
“I definitely brought some nerves to the tee because I wanted to hit a good shot for them,” she said. “I did end up hitting a good shot on that hole, which was good.”
Lilja-Vazquez has a history of coming through in competitions, including second-place finishes the last two years at the GHSA Class 2A state tournament. Now a junior at Savannah Arts Academy, she won the Savannah City High School Girls Championship as a freshman. She was second as a sophomore at the event at Bacon Park Golf Course, where the Savannah native grew up playing, and she also won the Area 3-2A tournament.
Maya Lilja-Vazquez walks the course with her group, including PGA Tour Champions player Gary Hallberg. Photo courtesy of Scott Lilja.
An honors student selected to the elite Governor’s Honors Program with a passion for science, she’s also a volunteer at Oatland Island Wildlife Center and participates in First Tee-Savannah. Together with her golf achievements, they helped make her a deserving representative of the local chapter at the national organization’s annual tie-in with the professional golf tournament in Pebble Beach, Calif.
“It was really, really special,” said Lilja-Vazquez, one of 80 teens in male and female divisions, competing in the event broadcast internationally on the Golf Channel. “Getting to hang out with kids who also work with First Tee, getting to know everyone and make new friends that, hopefully, I’ll meet again in the future while playing on such a gorgeous course.”
Actually, two gorgeous courses, as the tournament also includes one round at nearby Spyglass Hill Golf Course. Lilja-Vazquez, who enjoys playing Savannah Golf Club – where she works in the pro shop – and as a junior golfer has competed in Pinehurst, N.C., rates the California courses as the two best she’s played.
Regarding the scenic views at Pebble Beach, with overlooks of the Pacific Ocean, she said, “The fourth hole is like where you first see the ocean. It was so amazing. It was definitely breathtaking, just looking out. I kind of got distracted from the whole game of golf and just looked out. It was really cool.”
Maya Lilja-Vazquez competes at Pebble Beach Golf Links. Photo courtesy of First Tee-Savannah.
She played an 18-hole practice round at Pebble Beach with fellow First Tee girls on Wednesday of tournament week. She hit a really good shot at No. 8 and then hit another ball which she “donated to the golf course off the cliff.”
Hallberg joined her group for nine of the 18 holes of her practice round that Thursday at Spyglass Hill, which is where their tournament started for real on that Friday. Lilja-Vazquez said the rounds at Spyglass Hill did not have television cameras and spectators were limited but did include her father, Scott Lilja.
From left, amateur Clif Inge, PGA Tour Champions player Gary Hallberg, Savannah’s Maya Lilja-Vazquez and amateur Ben Sutton. Photo courtesy of First Tee-Savannah.
She had to adjust to the climate -- which she said got into the 60s compared to the summer-like temperatures back home -- and to the courses, finding the smooth greens “amazing” and the rough, well, rough.
They played best ball, with her team taking the better score each hole between her and Hallberg -- who also had a separate competition with the tour pros, as well as the adult amateurs in another division. Keeping her individual score was complicated because she picked up her ball if Hallberg already secured the better result, and vice versa, or if they tied.
Lilja-Vazquez recalled that she helped the team on two of the holes at Spyglass Hill in Round 1, and on seven of the holes on Saturday at Pebble Beach. She said they were 4-under par as a team in the first round, and 1 under in the second round, and missed the cut as the top 12 advanced to Sunday’s final round at Pebble Beach.
Hallberg’s last Pebble Beach tournament
She didn’t know until that Saturday that the 68-year-old Hallberg, a one-time winner on the senior tour and a three-time winner on the PGA Tour, where he was rookie of the year in 1980, was retiring. The 2026 event would be his last competitive tournament at Pebble Beach.
Hallberg, who also missed the cut in the tour event at 71-79—150 (6 over), was “really sweet” to Lilja-Vazquez, and she really enjoyed playing with him.
It was a learning experience as she walked inside the ropes, lugging her bag on a push cart while the grown-ups had caddies.
“Just being able to hear how everyone else thinks of the game of golf; everyone’s different,” she said, and she was able to talk at times with Hallberg and his caddie as well as the amateurs. “The thought processes while they’re playing are really cool. Hearing how the caddies talk to their pros. I really learned a lot. Gary taught me a lot. He’s really into using the wind when he plays, so that was really interesting. I never thought of stuff like that.”
The education wasn’t exclusive to golf, as Lilja-Vazquez brought her laptop to try to keep up with classwork. SAA continued the fall session without her that week.
“I had a lot of homework to do. It was hard,” said Lilja-Vazquez, estimating she spent 2-4 hours each day on work for her mix of advanced placement and honors courses. “I really tried to do as much as I could, the stuff I knew I had to turn in.”
Her first-ever trip to the West Coast started with a 24-hour day, as she rose at 6 a.m. that Monday in Savannah to attend school, later connected through Chicago for a flight landing around midnight Pacific time in San Francisco, then drove two hours to the hotel near the courses and was in bed by 3 a.m. (6 a.m. Eastern).
Maya Lilja-Vazquez and her father, Scott Lilja, stand at the seventh hole at Pebble Beach Golf Links. Photo courtesy of Scott Lilja.
Her last day on the coast, that Sunday, she played The Hay, a nine-hole, par-3 course, then attended the final round, followed by a tournament dinner, then did homework on the drive to catch her midnight (local time) flight out of San Francisco.
She got back to Savannah around 9 a.m. (local time), rested, went to an afternoon dentist appointment scheduled six months earlier, and did homework before bed.
That Tuesday, she went to school, did some catching up, and played afterward in the Panthers flag football team’s first game of the season.
Her whirlwind of a golfer’s dream week at Pebble Beach, she said, was “totally worth it.”
Follow Prep Sports Report on X @PrepSav and Instagram @savannahsportsreport.
To share scores, story ideas, or corrections, email kdemasi@prepsportsreport.com.
