It was just about this time two years ago when Wake Forest cruised to a 26-shot victory in the Darius Rucker Intercollegiate, one of the biggest events on the college women’s golf calendar each year.
The Demon Deacons, who had lost in the NCAA Championship’s Final Match the previous spring to Atlantic Coast Conference rival Duke at The Blessings Golf Club in Fayetteville, Ark., would rise to the top of the Golfstat rankings off of that performance.
You know what happened next. Those seemingly faraway stories of a virus infecting people in China eventually landed right on our doorsteps. The world as we knew it came grinding to a halt and the wraparound 2019-2020 college golf season was over.
Wake Forest would not get back on the golf course until early in 2021, the fall portion of the wrapround 2020-’21 schedule again a victim of the coronavirus pandemic for the ACC teams. It was still a strong Wake Forest team, but the Demon Deacons never really got it going last spring.
With travel still uncertain, the Darius Rucker, which draws a national field, was not played a year ago.
The Darius Rucker Intercollegiate was back this week and so was Wake Forest. The Golf Channel’s cameras were there, too, for the first time. The NCAA Championship is televised as is the East Lake Cup in the fall. But a spring tournament featuring college women’s golf, that’s a nice development.
Getting a second straight outstanding performance from Carolina Chacarra, a freshman from Spain who captured the individual crown by two shots, Wake Forest, No. 5 in the latest Golfstat rankings, beat tournament host South Carolina by nine shots to again capture the team title in the Darius Rucker Intercollegiate, which wrapped up Wednesday at the Long Cove Club’s Pete Dye Course on Hilton Head Island, S.C.
The individual champion when Wake Forest rolled to the team title two years ago was the Demon Deacons’ Emilia Migliaccio. This year she was doing post-round interviews in her role as an intern at The Golf Channel, although she plans to return to Wake Forest in the summer to play the extra year of eligibility granted by the NCAA to make up for that spring of 2020 lost to the pandemic.
Migliaccio had something of an epiphany last spring as she decided maybe professional golf wasn’t where she was headed. Rejuvenated, she lost in a playoff in the Augusta National Women’s Amateur Championship and helped the United States retain the Curtis Cup with a victory over Great Britain & Ireland at Conwy Golf Club in Caernarvonshire, Wales in August.
The star of the 2020 Darius Rucker got a chance to interview the star of this year’s Darius Rucker after Migliaccio’s future teammate, Chacarra, completed her second straight 2-under-par 69 over a 6,281-yard, par-71 Pete Dye Course layout that played pretty tough, for a 4-under 209 total. Chacarra had matched par in Monday’s opening round with a 71.
Chacarra is the younger sister of Oklahoma State senior Eugenio Chacrarra, who started his college career at Wake Forest before transferring and is No. 4 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR). The younger Chacarra was coming off an individual crown in the UCF Challenge at Eagle Creek Golf Club in Orlando, Fla. that featured a spectacular final round of 10-under 62.
Wake Forest had opened with a 7-over 291 that left it in a tie for fourth place. The Demon Deacons then took control of the tournament with a 4-under 280, the best team round of the week, before closing with a 6-over 290 that gave them a 9-over 861 total.
Southeastern Conference power and tournament host South Carolina, ranked fourth, closed with a 1-under 283 to claim runnerup honors with an 18-over 870 that left it nine shots behind Wake Forest. The Gamecocks had struggled in the opening round, posting a 19-over 303, before matching par in Tuesday’s second round with a 284.
The Pac-12’s Arizona State finished two shots behind South Carolina in third place with a 1-under 212 total. The Sun Devils were one of the three teams among the top six in the final Darius Rucker team standings that were among the last eight standing for match play in last spring’s NCAA Championship at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.
Arizona State dropped a spot in the Golfstat rankings with its third-place finish from No. 13 to No. 14. The Sun Devils lost to Duke in the NCAA Championship’s quarterfinals last spring.
A couple of Big 12 entries, Texas and Baylor, finished in a tie for fourth place, each landing a shot behind Arizona State with a 21-over 873 total.
It is a much different Texas team than the one that fell to eventual champion Mississippi in the NCAA Championship’s quarterfinals at Grayhawk with the departure of veterans Kaitlyn Papp and Agathe Laisne. But the Longhorns, ranked fourth, got a runnerup finish from Bobyun Park, a freshman from Farmers Branch, Texas, in a solid showing.
Texas opened with a solid 5-over 289 and added a 6-over 290 in Tuesday’s second round before closing with a 10-over 294. Baylor, which moved up a spot in the Golfstat rankings from No. 21 to No. 20 in the aftermath of the Darius Rucker, had the lead with its opening round of 3-over 287. The Bears added a 7-over 291 in Tuesday’s second round before finishing up with an 11-over 295.
No. 18 Auburn, the reigning SEC champion, was two shots behind Texas and Baylor in sixth place with a 23-over 875 total. The Tigers, whose strong postseason run last spring ended with a loss to Oklahoma State in the NCAA Championship quarterfinals, bounced back from an opening-round 298 with a solid 1-over 285 in Tuesday’s second round before closing with an 8-over 292.
A couple of perennial SEC powers, No. 17 LSU and No. 8 Alabama, were next in the team standings in the elite 17-team field with the Bayou Tigers taking seventh place with a 26-over 878 total, three shots behind Auburn, and the Crimson Tide taking eighth, two shots behind LSU with a 28-over 880 total.
LSU struggled in Tuesday’s second round with a 301 after it had opened with a 7-over 291, but the Bayou Tigers closed with a solid 2-over 286. Alabama was in contention for the team crown after adding a 5-over 289 to its opening-round 290 before the Crimson Tide struggled to a 301 in the final round.
Backing up Chacarra for Wake Forest was Rachel Kuehn, a junior from Asheville, N.C. and No. 11 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR) who finished among the group tied for 13th place with a 4-over 217 total.
Kuehn, the medalist in qualifying for match play in the U.S. Women’s Amateur at Westchester Country Club in Rye, N.Y. and a teammate of Migliaccio’s on the winning U.S. team in the Curtis Cup Match last summer, sandwiched an even-par 71 in Tuesday’s second round with a pair of 2-over 73s.
Lauren Walsh, a junior from Ireland and No. 19 in the Women’s WAGR, and Mimi Rhodes, a sophomore from England, gave Wake Forest two players in the group tied for 20th place, each landing on 6-over 219.
Walsh was an opponent of her Wake Forest teammates Migliaccio and Kuehn as a member of the GB&I team in a very competitive Curtis Cup Match at Conwy. Decent chance all three of them will be at Merion Golf Club’s iconic East Course when the 42nd Curtis Cup Match tees off in 97 days.
After opening with a 74, Walsh matched the low round of the week with a 3-under 68 in Tuesday’s second round before struggling to a 77 in Wednesday’s final round. Rhodes added a 1-over 72 to her opening-round 73 and closed with a 74.
Kuehn and Walsh were both in the starting lineup for Wake Forest in its victory in the Darius Rucker two years ago.
Rounding out the Wake Forest lineup was graduate student Virunpat Olankitkunchai of Thailand and No. 79 in the Women’s WAGR. Olankitkunchai is taking her extra year of eligibility at Wake Forest after being a standout at Maryland. Olankitkunchai added a 76 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 75 before closing with a counting 3-over 74 to finish among the group tied for 50th place with an 11-over 225 total.
Texas’ Park carded back-to-back 1-under 70s in the first two rounds and was tied with Chacarra, a shot behind Arizona State’s Calyanne Rosholt, a freshman from Cedar Park, Texas, heading into Wednesday’s final round. Park matched par in the final round with a 71 to finish two shots behind Chacarra in second place with a 2-under 211 total.
Rosholt had added a 2-under 69 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 70 to take the lead heading into the final round before closing with a 73 to finish in a tie for third place with Vanderbilt’s Celina Sattelkau, a junior from Germany.
Sattlekau, who finished in third place in last spring’s SEC Championship at Greystone Golf & Country Club in Birmingham, Ala., matched par in the opening round with a 71 and added a 72 in Tuesday’s second round before finishing strong with a final round of 2-under 69.
Texas’ Sara Kouskova, a senior from the Czech Republic, finished a shot behind Rosholt and Sattelkau in fifth place with an even-par 213 total. Kouskova sandwiched a solid 2-under 69 in Tuesday’s second round with a pair of 1-over 72s.
Rosholt’s Arizona State teammate, Alexandra Forsterling, a sophomore from Germany and No. 32 in the Women’s WAGR, was part of a trio of players tied for sixth place at 1-over 214, a shot behind Kouskova. Forsterling matched par in Tuesday’s second round with a 71 after opening with a 70 before finishing up with a 73.
LSU’s Latanna Stone, a junior from Riverview, Fla. and No. 49 in the Women’s WAGR, and South Carolina’s Mathilde Claisse, a junior from France, rounded out the group tied for sixth place.
Stone got it going in Tuesday’s second round with a 2-under 69 after opening with a 73. Stone, who finished just behind Sattelkau in fourth place in last spring’s SEC Championship at Greystone, closed with a 1-over 72. After opening with a 74, Claisse posted back-to-back 1-under 70s in the final two rounds.
Rounding out the top 10 were three players – Alabama’s Benedetta Moresco, a sophomore from Italy and No. 17 in the Women’s WAGR, Arkansas’ Kajal Mistry, a junior from South Africa, and Auburn’s Anna Foster, a sophomore from Ireland – who finished in a tie for ninth place, each landing on 2-over 215.
Moresco sandwiched a 73 in Tuesday’s second round with a pair of even-par 71s. Mistry added a 1-over 72 to her opening-round 73 before closing with a 1-under 70. Foster sandwiched an even-par 71 in Tuesday’s second round with a pair of 1-over 72s.
No. 21 Duke has struggled a little after Gina Kim, another member of that winning U.S. Curtis Cup team last summer in Wales, moved on to the pro ranks during the midseason pause. The Blue Devils, who reached the semifinals of the NCAA Championship at Grayhawk before falling to Oklahoma State last spring, finished in 10th place in the Darius Rucker with a 33-over 885 total.
Leading the way for Duke was sophomore Phoebe Brinker, an Archmere Academy product from Wilmington, Del. who finished among the group tied for 16th place with a 5-over 218 total. Brinker, who finished in a tie for fifth place in the individual chase in the NCAA Championship at Grayhawk, struggled in Tuesday’s second round with a 76 after opening with a 73, but got it going in the final round with a solid 2-under 69.
Another recent Delaware scholastic standout, freshman Rylie Heflin, a resident of Avondale just over the Pennsylvania line from the First State who starred at Tower Hill, has been thrown in the deep end with the Blue Devils in her first season. Heflin finished in a tie for 68th place as she added a 3-over 74 in Tuesday’s second round to her opening-round 77 before closing with a 78 for a 229 total.
Vanderbilt, another SEC entry, finished 12th in the team standings with a 35-over 887 total in the Darius Rucker.
The Commodores also have a freshman with local ties who has been thrust into the starting lineup in her first season in Natasha Kiel, a New Hope resident who starred at the George School before finishing up her scholastic career in Florida at the Montverde Academy.
Kiel joined Heflin in the group tied for 68th place at 229 as she added a 4-over 75 in Tuesday’s second round after opening with a 76 before closing with a 78.
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