By Alex Blumer
Enquirer contributor

When Mary Ann Plunkett and Kim Keyer-Scott tee off in today's final of the Sterling Cut Glass Women's Metropolitan Amateur Championships at Coldstream Country Club, it will be the first championship match for both.

But that's about the only similarity between the two, who have traveled very different paths to get to this point.

For Plunkett, 20, who spent three years polishing her game at the Leadbetter Academy in Florida, her first Met appearance has been a successful one. Plunkett's opening-round 72 established her as the player to beat in a field full of former champs.

Plunkett's rival today, Keyer-Scott, began playing competitive golf only three years ago. The 36-year-old Northern Kentucky University senior-to-be broke through to the final match after losing in the semis each of the past three Mets.

Things got considerably tougher for Plunkett in Thursday's semifinal, which matched her with another big hitter in Lynn Thompson.

The difference in the match, however, proved to be putting, as Plunkett came up with some clutch shots on the back nine to secure a 3-and-2 decision.

"I don't think she had her top game today," Thompson said of Plunkett, "but I think she found it a little bit on the back nine."

Plunkett's short game won her the 10th and gave her a seemingly comfortable three-hole lead.

But Thompson roared back to within one by taking the 12th and the 13th.

Thompson almost had the equalizer on the par-3 14th, but her birdie attempt skidded past the hole.

Clinging to a one-hole lead, Plunkett recovered to birdie 15 and 16 and end the match.

"Lynn just started playing really well, to the point where I had to answer," Plunkett said.

In the other semifinal, Keyer-Scott topped Bernice Gallagher, the last remaining Coldstream member, in a 2-and-1 match that neither will look back on too fondly.

"I knew I wanted to make the finals and that I had a chance to, and I might have been trying too hard (because of that)," Keyer-Scott said.

Said Gallagher: "Other than 11 (where she hit it in the water), it was my putting that did me in."

Plunkett and Keyer-Scott's championship match begins at 9:30 a.m today at Coldstream.