UA women look to ride momentum at regional
FAYETTEVILLE — The No. 3 Arkansas Razorbacks women’s golf team enters NCAA regional play today as one of the country’s hottest teams but also one with a big target on their backs.
The Razorbacks won their first SEC championship two weeks ago in Hoover, Ala., and earned the No. 1 seed at the NCAA Austin Regional at the University of Texas Golf Club. The University of Arkansas, Fayetteville will tee it up on No. 1 today at 8 a.m. with host and No. 7 Texas and No. 10 Michigan State as the top three seeds.
Arkansas Coach Shauna Taylor said she thinks the Razorbacks have kept their eyes on the big prize and won’t be consumed by the SEC title.
“They know the bigger mission,” she said. “We tried to celebrate the SEC championship for a few days, but then it was back to work, back to finishing up school, back to our normal routine.”
The low six teams at each of four NCAA regionals will comprise the 24-team field for the NCAA championships on May 18-23 at Karsten Creek in Stillwater, Okla. The other regionals will be played at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco with No. 1 seed UCLA, at the Veller Seminole Golf Course & Club in Tallahassee, Fla., with No. 1 seed Alabama, and at the University Ridge Golf Course in Madison, Wisc., with No. 1 seed Duke.
Three other SEC teams — No. 14 Florida, No. 24 Auburn and Texas A&M — will join the Razorbacks in the 18-team field in Austin, which also includes seven
Texas-based teams.
Taylor and junior Maria Fassi, the runner-up for medalist honors at the SEC championships, pulled down coach and player of the year honors in the SEC.
The Razorbacks won three rounds of match play at the
SEC championships and look to be peaking at the right time.
“We talked about expectations a lot this week,” Taylor said. “Everybody expects us to do something. But it’s just really about us doing Arkansas and Arkansas’ way. If we do that we’ll be in a good position.”
The Razorbacks have been on their game all season, with the SECs making their program-record sixth tournament championship of the year. Taylor said the composition of her roster worked out well, with senior Alana Uriell joining a skilled junior class of Fassi, Cara Gorlei, Kaylee Benton and Dylan Kim.
“It’s been an awesome team,” Taylor said. “We got a little lucky with some transfers … with Kaylee Benton, who transferred from UNLV and Dylan Kim, who was an amazing player at Baylor.
“So we have those two transfers, and we spent a lot of time recruiting Maria Fassi. Went to South Africa to recruit Cara Gorlei. The recruiting world is the oxygen to our program, so you just try and go out and find the best fit. As a coach, it’s kind of coming together as far as having a lot of seniors and a lot of leadership in the lineup.”
The Razorbacks are aiming to carry on a vastly improved postseason from last year, when much the same roster finished fourth at SECs and failed to advance out of the NCAA Columbus (Ohio) Regional after an eighth-place finish.
Arkansas has not played the University of Texas course since the fall of 2011.
“I was just going back through my notes,” Taylor said Friday. “It’s a little hilly. We’ve been working on slopes. I know it’ll be hard and fast, so we’ve got to be mindful of rollouts.
“I think it’s going to play kind of short, so we’ve been working on our wedges and really trying to hone in that area. But it’s a great golf course for us. I expect it to be a little windy, as it usually is down there. We’ve been very blessed that we’ve had a lot of these conditions this year and I feel very comfortable about our regional selection.”