Team looks to compensate for sub-par season
By Daily Bruin Staff
May 3, 2001 9:00 p.m.
By Michelle Coppolella
Daily Bruin Contributor
A stellar fall season with first-place finishes in the SDSU Fall
Classic and the Rainbow Wahine Fall Golf Classic provided the UCLA
women’s golf team with hope for a phenomenal spring season
that could land the team a top-three finish in the Pac-10s for the
second consecutive year.
But things don’t always turn out as planned, and instead
the Bruins find themselves at the end of a frustrating spring
season filled with the same abundant potential it had in the
fall.
The only thing is that the potential remains untapped.
UCLA now hopes to utilize the raw skill and talent that has
failed to prevail during the spring as they enter the NCAA West
Regionals this Sunday through Tuesday in Corvallis, Ore.
“We build up to this event all year ““ it’s
been our big goal,” Head Coach Carrie Leary said.
“We’re here and it’s like, “˜Let’s
play already’. We’ve come to the end of the road and
the girls are excited and ready.”
Unfortunately, the end of the road is the same road that is
paved with three of the best teams in the nation, namely No. 2
Arizona, No. 3 USC and No. 5 Stanford.
But those teams don’t realize what UCLA is armed with. The
Bruins’ lineup will consist of All-Conference honorable
mention recipients freshmen Melissa Martin, Saki Uechi and Gina
Umeck, along with experienced seniors Leilani Bagby and Laura
Moffat.
Artillery like that promises to provide outstanding competition
on a weekend that will be filled with intensity and emotion as
co-captains Bagby and Moffat step onto a course in UCLA uniform for
the last time ever ““ unless the Bruins can capitalize and
advance to the NCAA Finals.
Last year, the Bruins finished in 14th place in the Regionals
after a third place finish in the Pac-10s. Despite a poorer seventh
place finish in the Pac-10s last week, Leary is confident that her
team will perform at the high-intensity level she knows it is
capable of.
“We’re going to get better results because the team
looks like it’s playing well now,” Leary said.
“We’ve had a couple players who were struggling in
earlier in the spring, and they did well in the Pac-10s. I really
think we’re going to put it all together as a
team.”
