Women's Golf Takes Sixth in Colorado

Coming off a win at the Princeton Invitational last weekend, the Harvard women’s golf team tied for sixth in the Golfweek Women’s Conference Challenge this week at the Red Sky Golf Club in Vail, Colorado. The team faced both a difficult course and challenging conditions on its way to a score of 925 over three rounds.

“It’s a really difficult, severe golf course,” head coach Kevin Rhoads said. “It took a lot of local knowledge, it was hard to make a lot of putts, and it has a difficult setup. The scoring wasn’t fantastic, but relative to the field, we did pretty well.”

The weather also showed no sympathy, as the entire field was forced to deal with lightning, rain, and strong winds throughout the tournament.

“We had to face all these obstacles, not just playing golf, but also facing the elements,” sophomore Courtney Hooton said. “But I thought we did a really great job of focusing on our process and our goals as a team. I think we handled everything that was going on around us very well.”

After finishing tied for fourth individually at Princeton, freshman Anne Cheng once again excelled in Colorado. In just her second collegiate tournament, Cheng ended the tournament tied for eighth place, only 15 strokes behind first-place finisher Grace Na of Pepperdine.

“She played really solidly all week,” Rhoads said. “Her ball striking was very solid throughout three rounds, she made a lot of pars, [and] she gave us a lot of birdie chances. Besides the fact that some putts didn’t fall, she played extremely well.”

While Cheng finished over par in each of her three rounds this weekend, it was her consistency that allowed her to stay within the top ten. The freshman shot 75, 74, and 76 over the three rounds.

“I think I played pretty consistently with my iron shots and my driver shots throughout the week,” Cheng said. “But I wasn’t really expecting anything. I took everything shot by shot and didn’t really focus on the end result.”

Defending champion Pepperdine easily cruised to victory on the 1-2 finish of Na and sophomore Marissa Chow, winning by 36 strokes over runner-up UC Davis with a score of 869. Harvard finished 57 strokes behind the 15th-ranked Waves, who won their second consecutive and third overall title at the event.

“The scoring was high for everyone except Pepperdine,” Rhoads said. “They went crazy. They shot normal scores, and no one else really seemed to be able to do that.”

After finishing last year ranked 26th in the country, Pepperdine appears poised to do well again this season. The decisive win in Colorado came after a win at the Dick McGuire Invitational in New Mexico on Saturday. Additionally, Na is currently ranked 10th in Golfweek’s national ranking of individual golfers. She and Chow were the only two to finish the tournament under par this weekend.

Harvard started off well on Monday against the national competition, posting a score of 312 and sitting in seventh place after the first round. The team then improved Tuesday, shooting a 309 to pass Florida International University and finish the day in sixth. On Wednesday, the Crimson shot a 304 to finish tied for sixth overall with Saint Mary’s University.

“We can play one out-of-region tournament for the fall, and it’s a really good way to keep us on our toes and to play against the best competition we can find,” Rhoads said. “On the flip side, it also lets people outside the Ivy League know what we’re doing and see the level at which we’re playing.”

Junior captain Tiffany Lim struggled with illness after her win in Princeton last week, finishing the tournament in 42nd place. Senior Bonnie Hu and Hooton picked up the slack, finishing in 28th and 37st place, respectively.

“I always feel like when we go to a tournament, we have the potential of getting first place because we all have the potential to go low,” Hooton said. “It’s just a matter of us all doing that at the same time.”

The Harvard Invitational is the next event for the Crimson, and the squad will be hoping it can carry forward its recent form back on its home turf.

“We have a very solid team,” Rhoads said. “As long as they don’t take the scores as too much of a hit to their confidence, I think there are actually a lot of positives to take from the week.”