Belac, Wang send Duke to top of the leaderboard in Northrop Grumman Regional Challenge

   This spring, Duke will be trying to do something no Division I women’s team has done since, well, Duke.

   Not since the Dookies of 2005 to 2007 won three straight national championships has a team repeated as the top team in Division I women’s golf. Nobody has done it since the final match-play layer was added to the equation at the NCAA Championship in 2015.

   But the reigning national champion Blue Devils look quite capable of pulling it off. In Monday’s second round of the Northrop Grumman Regional Challenge, one of the most impressive gatherings of college golf talent this side of the NCAA Championship, Duke, playing without its best player, cruised to the top of the leaderboard with a scintillating 11-under-par 273 at Palos Verdes Golf Club in Palos Verdes Estates, Calif.

   Ana Belac, a senior from Slovenia, and Miranda Wang, a redshirt junior from China, each blitzed the 6,017-yard, par-71 Palos Verdes layout with a 5-under 66, matching the low round of the day, as the Blue Devils, probably a little underrated at No. 12 in the latest Golfstat rankings, improved by 18 shots from their opening-round 291 for a 36-hole total of 4-under 564.

   Duke was the only team in the elite 16-team field under par after two rounds and will take an eight-shot advantage over Pac-12 power UCLA, ranked 19^th, into Tuesday’s final round. The Bruins, playing 24 miles from their downtown Los Angeles campus, had the day’s second-best team round, a 5-under 279, after opening with a 293 and stood at 4-over 572.

   No. 1 Texas, the reigning three-time Big 12 champion, matched par with a 284 Monday after opening with a 290 and was alone in third place at 6-over 574, two shots behind UCLA.

   Then there was Wake Forest, which bested Duke in the Atlantic Coast Conference Championship and gave the Blue Devils all they wanted in a heart-stopping 3-2 loss in the Final Match at The Blessings Golf Club in Fayetteville, Ark. last spring. The No. 3 Demon Deacons were tied for fourth place with No. 5 Southern California, which has reached match play every year since match play was added to the NCAA Championship, at 8-over 576, two shots behind Texas.

   Wake Forest matched par with a 284 Monday after opening with an 8-over 292 while Southern Cal, like its cross-town rival UCLA playing close to home, carded a 4-under 280 after opening with a 296.

No. 4 Arizona State joined its Pac-12 rivals UCLA and Southern Cal among the top six as the Sun Devils were alone in sixth place at 9-over 577, a shot behind the Trojans and Wake Forest. Arizona State matched par with a 294 Monday after opening with a 293.

   It was four shots back to No. 33 Auburn out of the Southeastern Conference, which was alone in seventh place at 13-over 581. The Tigers had grabbed the opening-round lead with a sparkling 1-under 283, but fell back a little Monday with a 14-over 298.

   No. 2 Kent State, which has won four of the five tournaments it has teed it up in during the wraparound 2019-2020 season, and No. 6 Stanford were two shots behind Auburn in a tie for eighth place at 15-over 583.

   After opening with a solid 5-over 289, the Golden Flashes slipped a little with a 10-over 294 in Monday’s second round.

   No team took a bigger hit over the midseason break than the Cardinal, which shaved 13 shots off its opening-round 298 with a 1-over 285 Monday. Stanford, the reigning Pac-12 champion, lost two of the top three players in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR) when Andrea Lee and Albane Valenzuela, having earned their way to the LPGA Tour, decided to turn pro and not return for the spring portion of their senior seasons.

   It was the right time for two players who did everything at Stanford but win a national championship. Pretty sure the Cardinal fully expect to be contending for an NCAA crown this spring at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. regardless.

   The matching 66s by Belac and Wang, who delivered Duke’s national championship with a seven-foot par putt on the 20^th hole of her match with Wake Forest’s Letizia Bagnoli, left them among a trio of players tied for fifth place at 2-under 140. Both had opened with matching 3-over 74s in some dicey weather, particularly by SoCal standards.

   Two of their teammates, Gina Kim, a sophomore from Chapel Hill, N.C. and No. 26 in the Women’s WAGR, and Megan Furtney, a freshman from St. Charles, Ill., were among six players tied for ninth place at even-par 142.

   Kim, who claimed low-amateur honors by finishing in a tie for 12^th place in last spring’s U.S. Women’s Open at the Country Club of Charleston, added a 1-under 70 to her opening-round 72 while Furtney matched par for the second straight day with another 71.

   While Duke was on its way to an NCAA title last spring, Furtney and her junior golf pal, Erica Shepherd, were teaming up to capture the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship at Timuquana Country Club in Jacksonville, Fla.

   It was the second USGA gold medal for Shepherd of Greenwood, Ind. She claimed the 2017 U.S. Girls’ Junior Amateur crown at sweltering Boone Valley Golf Club in Augusta, Mo. Shepherd is the fifth player in Duke’s lineup at Palos Verdes, but she has struggled this week.

   The Blue Devils have thrown out her rounds of 77 and 78 and her 155 total has left her among the group tied for 71^st place. But if the Dookies are involved in match play at Grayhawk in a few months, you could do worse than to throw a two-time USGA champion out there.

   Duke is in front of the most loaded field in women’s college golf despite the absence of junior Jaravee Boonchant, who was excused so she could play in the Women’s Amateur Asia Pacific Championship, which was scheduled to start Wednesday at Siam Country Club’s Waterside Course in her native Thailand. The event, however, was canceled due to concerns over the coronavirus in Asia. Boonchant is No. 14 in the Women’s WAGR.

   At the top of the individual standings are UCLA’s flashy freshman, Emma Spitz of Austria and No. 27 in the Women’s WAGR, and Auburn’s Kaleigh Telfer, a junior from South Africa, both of whom landed on 6-under 136.

   Spitz matched Belac and Miranda Wang for the low round of the day with a sizzling 5-under 66 after opening with a 70. Telfer had led the elite field with a sparkling 66 of her own in tough conditions Sunday before adding a 1-under 70 in Monday’s second round.

   Two of the best players in college golf, Arizona State’s Olivia Mehaffey, a senior from Northern Ireland and No. 17 in the Women’s WAGR, and Wake Forest’s Emilia Migliaccio, a junior from Cary, N.C. and No. 6 in the Women’s WAGR, were two shots behind the co-leaders at 4-under 138.

   Mehaffey, who has twice been a member of the Great Britain & Ireland team in the Curtis Cup Match and is the reigning Pac-12 individual champion, fired a 3-under 68 after opening with a 1-under 70. Migliaccio, who is a likely selection for the United States team for this spring’s Curtis Cup Match, had opened with a 68 before adding a 70 in Monday’s second round.

   As close as the Demon Deacons were to a national championship last spring, I have to believe Migliaccio’s a woman on a mission this spring.

   Joining Belac and Miranda Wang in the trio tied for fifth place at 2-under 140, two shots behind Mehaffey and Migliaccio, was Kent State’s Kory Nielsen, a junior home girl from Kent, Ohio who carded her second straight 1-under 70.

   Texas’ Sophie Guo, a freshman from Orlando, Fla., was alone in eighth place at 1-under 141 after she added a solid 2-under 69 to her opening-round 72.

   Guo’s fellow Longhorn, Kaitlyn Papp, a junior home girl from Austin, Texas and No. 13 in the Women’s WAGR, was among the group with Duke’s Kim and Furtney tied for ninth place at even-par 142. Like Duke’s Furtney and Shepherd, Papp teamed with her current Texas teammate Hailee Cooper to capture the U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball Championship in 2016 at the Streamsong Resort.

   Not that Texas needs any extra motivation, but Pat Weis, who started the program in 1969 and left her indelible imprint on the Longhorns, died Sunday at 89. I suspect Texas will celebrate the memory of one of the true pioneers of women’s college golf the best way they know how Tuesday. By playing some great golf.

   Rounding out the group tied for ninth place at even-par was a trio of Pac-12 stars, including another UCLA freshman phenom, Emilie Paltrinieri of Italy and No. 22 in the Women’s WAGR, Stanford’s Ziyi (Emily) Wang, a senior from China, and Southern Cal’s Amelia Garvey, a junior from New Zealand and No. 44 in the Women’s WAGR.

   Palttrinieri fired a 2-under 69 Monday after opening with a 73, Emily Wang added a 1-under 70 to her opening-round 72 and Garvey, who opened with a solid 2-under 69, fell back a little with a 2-over 73.