Women's Golf Prepares for NCAA Championships

May 8, 2007

MEADVILLE, Pa. –A season ago, the Allegheny College Gator women’s golf team, the “new kids on the block”, advanced to the NCAA Division III National Championships in their first year as a program, sitting in ninth place from wire-to-wire.

A year removed from the inaugural season, the Gators have continued their streak, advancing to the National Championships for the second consecutive season.

This year, however, was a different hurdle to leap. Last season the selection committee took a total of 10 teams, two from each of women’s golf five regions, while this year, the first year of a new Automatic Qualifier, the Gators had to vie for one of a limited number of “Pool B” bids, ones that are designated for teams without conferences, or in conferences with seven or fewer members, as the committee selected a total of 20 squads.

The significance of now being one of 20 teams was not lost on Allegheny head coach Jeff Groff. “We are thrilled to be going back,” said Groff. “I have always told the men’s team, and now with the women’s team, that you never know if you are going to get that bid again and go back. Every time you get one, you are happy with the year that you had, and looking forward to the intense competition at the Championships.”

Last season one of the team’s goals was to finish in at least ninth place, which they accomplished. This year, despite the doubling of the field, the Gators are once again putting their top goal as a top 10 finish.

“We talked about goals briefly,” said the second year women’s coach. “We pulled the scores from last year, the hole-by-hole results for all of the players for all for rounds, and one of our main goals, which may sound like common sense, is to avoid some of the larger numbers we had on some of the holes. We had some big numbers, triple bogeys and so forth, and if we can worry about making pars and bogeys on those holes it will make a huge difference from a year ago. Another top-10 finish is out there, and being seeded 12th coming into the tournament, if we can sneak out a few spots and do our thing, we could very well do it.”

One thing not new for this squad is the course, the Mission Inn Golf and Tennis Resort in Howey-in-the-Hills, Florida. It is the same course that the team played on last year, along with playing in a round earlier last season. “Four out of our five players that were at the championships last season are in our top five right now,” said Groff. “We are playing the same course we were on last year, and the four that are back have played it for six or seen rounds already, so there should be nothing new out there – the course won’t give us any surprises.”

This season the Gators have been led by a trio of players averaging under 87 strokes per round. Alison Bruckner (Glenview, Ill./Glenbrook South) has a team-best 85.28 scoring average this season, including six individual top-1o finishes, while Jaime Reints (St. Charles, Ill./St. Charles East) and Lisa Coleman (Lakeview, N.Y./Frontier Central) are averaging 85.83 and 86.83 strokes, respectively, with both also having six top-10 finishes. Lauren Torso (Zelienople, Pa./Seneca Valley) has been the fourth person for the majority of the season for the Blue and Gold, averaging 92 strokes per round, as Kim Elam (Batavia, Ill./Batavia) will be the team’s fifth golfer at the championships, carding an average of 95 strokes per round.

The Championships begin on Tuesday, May 8 when the Gators tee off starting at 8:20 a.m. on the back nine of the El Campeon Course. Allegheny is paired with Olivet (Mich.) and Simpson (Iowa) for the first round. Elam’s threesome will tee off at 8:20 a.m. with Torso’s going off at 8:30. Coleman and Reints will tee off at 8:40 and 8:50, respectively, as Bruckner’s group will be the final one to go on the morning session, teeing off at 9:00.

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