Indiana University Athletics
Women's Golf Open Spring at Central District Invitational
2/15/2008 12:00:00 AM | Women's Golf
Feb. 15, 2008
Complete Release in PDF Format
SETTING THE SCENE
• The Hoosiers officially open the spring season against a tough field at the Central District Invitational in Parrish, Fla.
• The field features the top teams in the region and could very well be a preview of the 2008 NCAA Central Regional.
• The field includes No. 15 Kent State, No. 20 Notre Dame, No. 21 Michigan State, No. 25 Texas A&M, No. 30 Texas, No. 34 Oklahoma, No. 38 Ohio State, No. 44 Missouri, No. 45 Nebraska and No. 47 Indiana.
THE LINEUP
• Sophomore Anita Gahir
• Senior Lauren Harling
• Sophomore Laura Nochta
• Senior Elaine Harris
• Sophomore Kellye Belcher
NEWS AND NOTES
• The Hoosiers got some practice time in out in Arizona last weekend with exhibition match play against Wisconsin.
• Playing a nassau, with a point awarded for the front nine, back nine and overall score, Indiana fell 10-8 to the Badgers.
• Sophomore Anita Gahir led all players with a low round of 71. She was also the only player to pick up the maximum three points.
• In a practice round on Saturday, junior Amber Lindgren recorded a hole in one.
• After this weekend IU won't return to the course again until March 10-12 at the UNLV Spring Invitational in Nevada.
• In 2007, Elaine Harris was the top IU finisher at the UNLV event, posting a three-round score of 214 which was goof for 10th place.
OUT OF THE GATES
• 2007 marked the first time the Hoosiers opened the fall with four-straight top-five finishes since the 2002-03 season.
• Indiana is averaging a score of 305.13 per round, which if maintained through the spring would be the third-lowest average on record in school history.
• In 2006-07 Indiana finished no worse than 11th in any of its five fall tournaments. In 2007-08 the Hoosiers worst finish was 10th at the Palmetto Intercollegiate.
COACH WALLMAN ON THE CENTRAL DISTRICT INVITATIONAL:
• "The level of competition is pretty good... the best teams in the central region, highlighted by Notre Dame, Michigan State, Texas A&M and Kent State. It is pretty top-heavy."
• "It will be a good challenge for us coming out of the winter break."
• "I have seen it (the course). It is a good private country club course. It is a ball strikers course. If you just keep it in play you should give yourself pretty good opportunities for birdies."
• "With this being in Florida, the grain of the greens is going to probably be our biggest challenge. We haven't spent a lot of time putting outside, let alone putting with greens with any sort of grain in them. So that is the area that we are really going to focus on heading down there."
COACH WALLMAN ON LAST WEEKEND'S PERFORMANCE IN ARIZONA:
• "I definitely saw improvement from where we left off in the fall. In the fall we addressed a couple of areas, short-game wedges, putting techniques and just our overall conditioning. The girls worked really hard this off season and they came out really strong."
• "Our tee-to-green game was very good down there. There was a little rust in some areas that you would expect it, but overall I think they played very well considering the bit of layoff we've had."
• "Anita played really solidly (in Arizona). She's been battling injuries on and off the last year and a half. I think this is probably the healthiest she's been and it definitely showed in her ball striking. She had a ton of greens, she hit it close. She played very well, even more like a mid-season type form."
• "Lauren Harling did a tremendous job as well. She came out of the winter much more tuned up...another great ball striking job. She putted pretty well and she has spent a lot of time on her wedges over the year, so that was an area I saw a lot of improvement in."
• Laura (Nochta), Elaine (Harris) and Kellye (Belcher), they all played very solidly. They kind of got their feet back underneath them... we call it getting their `course sense' back. Considering that we didn't have any round higher than 78 over two rounds, I thought that was pretty good."
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE:
On the layoff between the Central District (Feb. 18-19) and UNLV Spring Invitational (March 10-12):
• "It is going to give us a chance to really assess what we need to do because a very good stretch run for us begins in March. We have the back-to-back tournaments at UNLV and Texas. Then we finish up the month down in Tucson. Then we follow that up with our home tournament. So in a span of four weeks we are playing four good fields and four quality tournaments."
• "We are going to utilize the couple of weeks in between the Central and when we head out to just kind of shore up our little details and really work on our wedge game, which is a big deal out at Vegas."
GOLFWEEK POLL
• Indiana is No. 47 in the latest Golfweek poll, released Feb. 10.
• The Hoosiers are fourth among Big Ten teams, behind No. 11 Purdue, No. 21 Michigan State and No. 38 Ohio State.
• Individual Rankings:
- Laura Nochta- 155
- Elaine Harris- 199
- Anita Gahir- 259
- Kellye Belcher- 265
- Lauren Harling- 431
- Amber Lindgren- 505
Players Mentioned
