When the downhill slider for eagle disappeared into the cup
on the 18th green at the Karsten Creek Golf Club last spring, the
putt that got Arizona into a playoff for the eighth and final berth in match
play in the NCAA Championship, Bianca Pagdanganan had established forever that
somewhere in her genetic makeup was the clutch gene.
Two days later Pagdanganan and the Wildcats stood at the top
of the heap with a stunning victory over top-ranked Alabama in the NCAA
Championship’s Final Match.
Pagdanganan, a senior from the Philippines, was at it again
in the final round of the Nanea Pac-12 Preview Wednesday at the Nanea Golf Club
in Kailua Kena, Hawaii. She had opened the tournament, which included the last
four NCAA team champions, with a thrown-out 81 Monday. She got better with an
even-par 73 over the 6,372-yard, par-73 Nanea layout in Tuesday’s second round.
But in Wednesday’s final round, when Arizona absolutely
needed its senior leader to weave her magic, when Pagdanganan had to be clutch,
she fired a 5-under 68 to lift the Wildcats, No. 24 in the latest Golfstat rankings, to the team title by
a shot over upstart California, which outplayed its No. 40 ranking.
Arizona got an outstanding performance throughout the
tournament from Yu-Seng Hou, a sophomore from Taiwan who shared the individual
title with fellow Taiwanese Tze-Hu Lin, a freshman at Oregon, as both landed on
6-under 213.
Hou was pretty clutch herself in a 4 and 3 victory over
Alabama’s Lauren Stephenson, who is headed for the LPGA Tour next year, in the
Final Match at Karsten Creek. Hou was the runnerup to Stanford’s Albane
Valenzuela, No. 3 in the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR), in the
one-day qualifying for match play in last week’s East Lake Cup.
At Nanea, Hou opened with a 4-under 69 and added a 2-under
71 before matching par in the final round with a 73 to get her share of the top
spot. Lin opened with a 1-under 72 and added a 2-under 71 before finishing up
with a 3-under 70 to also finish at 6-under 213.
The efforts by Pagdanganan and Hou enabled Arizona to finish
with a 2-under 874 total, a shot clear of California, which ended up at 1-under
875. Only five shots separated the Wildcats from sixth-place finisher Stanford,
ranked 13th, so this was a typically wide-open battle in the best
conference in Division I college golf.
Five teams bettered and one matched Arizona’s opening round
of 3-over 295. The Wildcats bounced back with a 3-under 289 to get it to
even-par and, behind Pagdanganan’s heroics, carded a 2-under 290 in the final
round that gave them the victory.
Cal had opened with a 3-under 289 and matched par in the
second round with a 292 to lead Arizona by three heading into the final round.
The Golden Bears’ final round of 2-over 294 wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t enough to
hold off Arizona.
Top-ranked Southern Cal, coming off its second straight East
Lake Cup title, shared third place with No. 45 Colorado at even-par 876.
The Trojans had shared the lead following the opening round,
their 3-under 289 matched by California and No. 48 Oregon. They slipped back a
little with a 4-over 296 in the second round before finishing up with a 1-under
291.
The Buffaloes were solid throughout, opening with a 2-under
290 before adding a pair of 1-over 293s to finish at even-par.
Oregon finished up with a 1-over 293 to end up
alone in fifth at 1-over 877, just three shots behind Arizona. Stanford, which
fell to Southern Cal in the East Lake Cup final, was two shots behind Oregon in
sixth at 3-over 879. The Cardinal have reached the semifinals in the NCAA
Championship every year since match play was implemented. You’d almost be
surprised to not see them there next spring.
No. 35 Oregon State finished alone in seventh at 10-over
886, seven shots behind Stanford. The Beavers struggled to a 306 in the second
round before bouncing back with the best team round of the tournament, a fairly
spectacularly 9-under 283, in the final round.
Two-time reigning Pac-12 champion UCLA, ranked sixth, was
four shots behind Oregon State in eighth at 14-over 890. The Bruins played
without Patty Tavatanakit, a sophomore from Thailand who is No. 6 in the
Women’s WAGR. Tavatanakit played eight rounds of the LPGA Q-Series, which
wrapped up Saturday.
No. 10 Arizona State, the 2017 NCAA champion, finished ninth
at 16-over 892. The steady Sun Devils had a pair of 5-over 297s in the first
two rounds before finishing up with a 6-over 298. No. 11 Washington, the 2016
NCAA champion, was another five shots behind Arizona State in 10th
at 21-over 897. The Huskies struggled a little in the final round with a 302.
Arizona came home from the East Lake Cup with a pair of
match-play losses to Southern Cal and Alabama. But the Wildcats were pretty
tough in the fall campaign windup in beating all their stud Pac-12 sisters.
Sandra Nordaas, a junior from Norway, sandwiched a 74 with a
pair of even-par 73s to finish in the group tied for 18th at 1-over
220. Pagdanganan’s final-round 68 left her among the group tied for 25th
at 3-over 222.
Haley Moore, the senior from Escondido, Calif. who gave
Arizona the NCAA title by winning her match on the 19th hole at
Karsten Creek, finished among the group tied for 36th at 226.
Moore’s 2-under 71 in the second round helped Arizona stay in contention for
the team title.
Ya Chun Chang, a freshman from Taiwan, rounded out the
Arizona lineup as she ended up in the group tied for 41st at 228.
The Wildcats tossed the 77s she posted in the second and third rounds, but her
2-over 74 in the opening round was huge with Pagdanganan struggling.
Stanford’s Andrea Lee, a junior from Hermosa Beach, Calif.
and No. 5 in the Women’s WAGR, finished in a tie for third in the individual
standings with Colorado’s Kirsty Hodgkins, a junior from Australia, at 4-under
215, two shots behind the co-champions.
Lee was probably disappointed after dropping a 2 and 1
decision to Southern Cal’s Gabi Ruffels, a sophomore from Australia, in the
deciding match of the Cardinal’s 3-2 loss to the Trojans in the East Lake Cup
final. Of course, if you’re always putting yourself in big, important spots, as
Lee does, you’re going to lose a few. Lee bounced back at Nanea as she matched
par in the opening round with a 73 and added a 1-under 72 before finishing up
with a 3-under 70.
After opening with a 76, Hodgkins found her groove with a
4-under 69 in the second round and a 3-under 70 in the final round.
Heading up a group of three players tied for fifth at
3-under 216 was Colorado’s Robyn Choi, a junior from Australia for whom this was her college golf swan song. I did a fairly lengthy post on all the college
players who did so well in the LPGA Q-Series, trying to figure out who was
going to play out the 2018-’19 season and who was going to turn pro with the
start of the 2019 LPGA season.
Well, almost all. Choi got back in the hunt to finish among
the top 45 in the LPGA Q-Series and earn an LPGA Tour card with rounds of 69
and 68 in rounds six and seven at Pinehurst No. 7. She finished up with a
2-over 74 and then had to sweat it out before learning that her 10-over 586 got
her in on the number, tied for 45th. She’s leaving college golf
behind and heading for the biggest stage in women’s golf.
I’ll give Colorado coach Anne Kelly credit. The coaches who
are losing players to the LPGA Tour in the middle of the season are
understandably ambivalent about the whole thing. Kelly is too, but in a post on
the Colorado website she was effusive in her praise of Choi’s accomplishment
and her contributions to the program.
At Nanea, Choi opened with a 3-under 70 and added a 2-over
74 before finishing up with a 1-under 72.
Sharing fifth with Choi were California’s Katherine Zhu, a
freshman from San Jose, Calif., and Oregon State’s Nicole Schroeder, a junior
from Rocklin, Calif. Zhu went 70-71 in the first two rounds before finishing up
with a 2-over 75.
Schroeder, who reached the NCAA Championship as an
individual last spring, zoomed up the leaderboard with a final round of 6-under
67, which matched the best individual round of the tournament. Her teammate
Ellie Slama, a sophomore from Salem, Ore., also had a 6-under 67 in the final
round, helping to fuel the Beavers’ surge Wednesday.
Southern Cal’s Ruffels, coming off her East Lake
Cup-clinching win over Stanford’s Lee, shared eighth place with California’s
Maria Herraez Galvez, a junior from Spain, at 2-under 217.
Ruffels opened with a 4-under 69 before falling back with a
3-over 76 in the second round and finishing up with a 1-under 72. Galvez closed
with a sparkling 4-under 69, her career best, to get her piece of eighth.
Cindy Oh, a senior from Gardena, Calif., gave Cal a third
top-10 finisher as she shared 10th with UCLA’s Beth Wu, a senior
from Diamond Bar, Calif., at 1-under 218.
Oh had grabbed the opening-round lead with a 6-under 67, the
low round of the tournament later matched in the final round by the Oregon
State duo, before backing off with a 75 in Tuesday’s second round and a 76 in
Wednesday’s final round.
Wu opened with a solid 3-under 70 and added a 2-over 75
before matching par in the final round with a 73.
As I mentioned in a post on the East Lake Cup, the Pac-12
has had three of the four semifinalists in the last two NCAA Championships. It
is going to be fascinating to see how it
all plays out for this talented group in the spring.
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