Women's Golf Finishes 23rd at NCAA Championship
5/25/2007 12:00:00 AM | Women's Golf
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. ?? After struggling for three rounds at the 2007 NCAA Championship, the University of Alabama team rebounded on the final day, shaving eight strokes off its third-round score to earn a 23rd-place finish. The Tide carded a 311 in the final round to go with scores of 319 in rounds two and three and a 314 in the opening round to finish with a 54-hole score of 1263 at the LPGA International Legends Course in Daytona Beach, Fla.
“I think now that this week is over we can take a look at ourselves from a bigger perspective,” said head coach Mic Potter. “We were disappointed with the way our season ended and the way we played at the Championship, but there’s no denying that we have come a long way this season and in the past two years. We have to get a lot better to be able to compete for national titles, but I think the steps we have taken so far are in the right direction.”
Duke won its third straight team title with UCLA and Purdue checking in at second and third respectively. USC and Stanford rounded out the top-5.
Alabama’s lowest round on each day of competition came from one of its two true freshmen on the roster. Rhea Nair took the honor on day four after classmate Helena Blomberg had paced the Tide in rounds two and three. Nair posted a 4-over 76 in the final round, posting four bogeys to go with 14 pars. She also had the team’s best round on opening day with a 75. Nair finished the Championship with a 72-hole tally of 315.
“If you told me at the beginning of the year that one of our two freshmen would have the low round every day at the NCAA Championship, I wouldn’t have believed it,” said Potter. “But they have worked hard to improve all season long, their attitudes have been great and they will do nothing but get better as their careers go along.”
Despite the fact that a freshmen posted the lowest round on each of the four days of play, the Tide’s lowest overall score still belonged to senior All-American Jenny Suh. Suh, who closed out her record-setting career at the Capstone by leading the Tide to two of its three all-time appearances in the NCAA Championship, shot a 6-over 78 in her final round of intercollegiate golf.
Suh finished with rounds of 77, 79, 77 and 78 to give her a four-round score of 311. She finished in a tie for 72nd place in the individual standings.
“Jenny’s finish today wasn’t what she would have liked, but when she gets a chance to look back she will realize how great her career was and how much she did for this program,” Potter said. “I can’t say enough how much she has done for Alabama golf. Her being here is brought this program along much quicker than it would have without her and the credibility she has brought to us is impossible to describe.”
Blomberg, a native of Uppsala, Sweden, who was one of the most improved players on the team in the spring season, finished the Championship with a 79 after rounds of 79, 78 and 76 on the first three days.
Junior Sarah Sturm closed out the event with her lowest round of the week after firing a 6-over 78 in the final round. Laura Goodwin, a sophomore from Birmingham, finished with an 83.
Arkansas’ Stacy Lewis came from six shots back to win the individual title, finishing six-under, shooting a 66 on the last day of the championship.
The conclusion of the NCAA Championship marks the end of a record-setting 2006-07 campaign for the Crimson Tide. In addition to qualifying for the Championship for just the third time in school history, the team set a new school mark for an individual round in the first event of the year and finished in the top five in six of its eight events in the spring season. Suh earned first team All-SEC honors and Potter was named SEC Co-Coach of the Year.
