Event: NCAA Championships
Where: Caves Valley Golf Club – Owing Mills, Md.
When: Today through Friday; all day
Who to watch: Sophomore Alice Kim will serve as the lone Aggie representing UC Davis at the NCAA Championships this year.
Kim led the UC Davis women’s golf team with four top-five individual finishes. She boasts an impressive 73.4 stroke average through 33 rounds of play.
Did you know? Don’t let Kim’s class standing fool you. She already has NCAA Championships experience on her side.
A principle part of now retired coach Kathy DeYoung’s “Cinderella” team from last year, Kim posted a team-best 300 over the four-day title event at the New Mexico Championship Course in Albuquerque, N.M. The Aggies finished at No. 21 in the nation as a team.
Preview: Only one season removed from a team title run, Kim returns as an individual to play against the best women golfers in the country.
This year’s championship will take place at the historic Caves Valley Golf Club in Owing Mills, Md. It will feature the top 24 golf teams in the nation, as well as the top six individuals not playing on a team contender.
Three pools have been created to break the 24-team field into eight-team East, Central and West Regions.
Coming out of the East is top-seed Denver, Alabama, Tennessee, Virginia, Tulane, Duke, North Carolina and Georgia.
UCLA leads the Central pack while Purdue, Wake Forest, Oklahoma State, Michigan State, New Mexico, Ohio State and Chattanoga round out the back end.
Out of the West is No. 1 seed Arizona State, USC, LSU, TCU, UC Irvine, Texas, Arizona and Pepperdine.
The individual field features Stephanie Connelly (UCF), Marina Alex (Vanderbilt), Kendall Dye (Oklahoma), Cindy LaCrosse (Louisville), Cathryn Bristow (Oregon) and finally Kim.
USC earned the team title by six strokes, carding an 1168. UCLA and Duke tied for second.
– Matt Miller
