The Trinity women’s golf team finished second in the Southern Collegiate Athletics Conference Championship. Last year the women’s team won the championship, finishing just one stroke ahead of Southwestern University .
The championship was a two-day, par-144 tournament starting April 20 and finishing April 21.
After the first day, the women’s golf team was in second with a combined score of 341. The team was only two strokes behind the leader, Schreiner University. Hanna Niner and Shelby DeVore led the Tigers with first-round scores of 84. Brigette Lee finished the first day one stroke back of Niner and DeVore.
Before the tournament Lee said, “I’m not nervous for conference. I know that we have prepared well and as long as we can keep our heads down and focus on one shot at a time, we will be successful.”
The women’s team was unable to move up on the final day of the tournament. The team shot a final-round combined score of 337 and finished as the runner-up for the SCAC Championship. The two round score for the Tigers was a combined 678, 11 strokes behind Schreiner University who shot a 328 on Tuesday.
DeVore shot 7 over par on the final day and finished the tournament tied for third place; she earned an All-SCAC First Team recognition.
DeVore’s combined score of 163 was the lowest score posted by first-year players earning her the SCAC Freshman Player of the Year award. This is the third year in a row that a Trinity player has won Freshman Player of the Year.
“Hearing my name called as Freshman Player of the Year was one of the most rewarding things. All of that hard work paid off. I could not have done it without my team or coach. They pushed me and encouraged me the whole year. I am glad I could be the third consecutive freshman to win the award from Trinity,” DeVore said.
Lee shot an 85 on the final day and was awarded All-SCAC Second Team honors. Lee shot a combined score of 170 and finished in 10th place individually. In 2013, Lee won the tournament and was named both Freshman Player of the Year and Player of the Year.
Niner finished eleventh individually and also received All-SCAC Second Team honors. Senior Alessa Hutter posted a combined 175 and finished tied for 13th place. Junior Madeline Moran placed 16th with a combined 180.
“We’ve had a great season. We’ve had two wins. We also have a pretty young team, so we’re hoping to be able to carry momentum into next year,” Lee said.
The Tigers can still receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Division III Championships. The team will find out if they received a bid or not by early May.
The Championship will be held May 12-15 at the Grandover Resort in Greensboro, North Carolina.
“The bright spot this year has been the improvement from everyone on the team,” said coach Carla Spenkoch.
