Women’s golf bounces back in Stanford/Pepsi tournament

One month removed from its last tournament action, the No. 2
UCLA women’s golf team captured second place at the
Stanford/Pepsi Intercollegiate tournament in Palo Alto, which
featured a newly designed Stanford golf course.

“It’s a good, challenging golf course,” coach
Carrie Forsyth said of the par-71, 6,025 yardage course.

“It demands a lot off of the tee with your tee shot.
It’s definitely one of the best courses we play.”

The Bruins had four of six players finish among the top 15
individuals, a stark contrast to their performance at the Mason
Rudolph Championship a month ago, in which only junior Hannah Jun
finished in the top 15.

“We looked a lot sharper this week,” Forsyth said.
“We definitely improved on our short game; the girls worked
really hard on chipping and putting. We’ve got a lot to build
on.”

Headed by sophomore Amie Cochran, whose 1-under-par performance
was good for sixth place, freshman Jane Park (+1), freshman Tiffany
Joh (+2) and senior Susie Mathews (+3) finished 9th, 10th, and
14th, respectively.

Joh played as an individual after sitting out the team’s
last tournament due to a pulled back muscle.

“We had a couple of good individual finishes, some good
individual rounds and a very good final round,” Forsyth
said.

“Other than the fact that we didn’t win, we had a
pretty good tournament.”

Despite the good overall showing, Forsyth maintains her team
still has room for improvement in the coming week’s
practices.

“I have a couple of players that really need to work on
birdie-type putts in competitive situations, so we’re going
to come up with a few things for this week to really keep building
on the momentum that we gained at Stanford,” Forsyth
said.

She also mentioned the effects that the lengthy layover between
tournament events had on her team.

“I think we were still in practice mode in the first
round. Once we start playing back-to-back events, we’ll
really begin to see where we measure up,” Forsyth said.

The Bruins finished 27 strokes behind top-ranked Duke
University, whose 18-under-par three-round score set a new course
record.

Duke’s Liz Janangelo won medalist honors with her
11-under-par total. Duke also nabbed first place in last
month’s Mason Rudolph Championship.

The Bruins resume tournament action on Oct. 31 at the UNLV Rebel
Invitational.

“I feel really good about our team’s prospects this
coming weekend. It’s a strong field, but we posted good
scores last weekend,” said Forsyth.

“I think we’re the strongest team in the West and
we’re looking for a team win and an individual
win.”