April 14, 2009
SDSU MWC Championship Notes in PDF Format
MWC Championships Up Next For SDSU Women's Golf
The San Diego State women's golf team resumes action after a more than two-week break, heading back to Seaside, Calif., for the 2009 Mountain West Conference championships, April 16-18. The 54-hole tournament takes place at the par-72, 6,027-yard Black Horse Golf Course.
The event will be held in California for the first time in conference history. Last year's championship was at the University of New Mexico course in Albuquerque, after two-straight years at the Entrada at Snow Canyon in St. George, Utah. The conference tournament was held in Sunriver, Ore., five straight seasons, after the inaugural event in St. George in 2000. Last year was the only time that the MWC championships has been held at a school's home course.
The Aztecs will be looking to improve on their seventh-place performance in the same tournament a year ago, facing a field of three schools ranked among the top 50 in the nation, including defending champion No. 24 New Mexico.
Schools will play 18 holes each of the three days, following a practice round Wednesday afternoon. The Aztecs will be paired with New Mexico and TCU in group No. 3 for the first round, starting at 9:10 a.m. PT from the first tee on Thursday.
Aztec Line-Up For This Week
Aztec head coach Felicia Brown will take one senior, two juniors, one sophomore and one freshman to this week's Mountain West Conference championships. Three of the four competed for SDSU at last year's conference tournament, while junior Heather Wilson (Chula Vista, Calif.) and freshman Malin Enarsson (Gothenburg, Sweden) will be making their MWC championship debuts.
Senior Maki Kamimura (West Covina, Calif.) is the only Aztec to have competed in more than one MWC tournament in her career, participating in the last three. Kamimura tied for 28th in 2008, after taking 19th in 2007, and 13th in 2006, when she was SDSU's top golfer
Joining Enarsson, Kamimura and Wilson are Stephanie Arcala (Oceanside, Calif.) and Petra Cole (San Diego, Calif.), who placed 33rd and 34th at the 2008 MWC championships.
The Competition
Three of SDSU's opponents this week are ranked in the top 50 in the golfstat.com rankings as of April 8. New Mexico, which has claimed the five MWC titles, is the highest ranked MWC school this season with a No. 26 spot by Golfstat and a No. 24 selection by Golfweek.
Three-time conference champ UNLV is No. 30 by Golfstat and No. 29 by Golfweek, while TCU is No. 36 and No. 35 respectively in the two polls. Two of the three other MWC schools are rated in the top 75, including No. 69/64 Colorado State and No. 81/73 BYU.
San Diego State, meanwhile sits at No. 85 in the Golfstat rankings, a 20-spot jump from last year at this time. Wyoming rounds out the field with a No. 108/112 ranking.
The Aztecs have three victories in head-to-head results versus Wyoming (3-1), and have split 1-1 versus Colorado State and BYU this season. SDSU have not finished ahead of New Mexico, TCU or UNLV in a tournament in 2008-09.
Individually, all five of the top finishers from last year's MWC tournament return, including two-time medalist Jodi Ewart from New Mexico, who won by two strokes with a even-par 219.
SDSU In The MWC Tournament
In the nine-year history of the Mountain West Conference, SDSU has finished second twice, fifth on four occasions and fourth, sixth and seventh once apiece.
Last season, the Aztecs were edged out of sixth place by just one stroke, finishing in seventh overall with a 93-over-969. SDSU was sixth in 2007, fifth in 2003, 2005 and 2006, fourth in 2004 and was runners-up in both 2001 and 2002. The Aztecs were disqualified in the inaugural tournament in 2000, after two players turned in incorrect score cards in the third and final round.
Individually, the highest SDSU finish came in 2002, when Heather Rollo tied for second place with a 218, just two strokes out of first. Jenna Wilson owns the school record for the best score in a 54-hole conference tournament with a two-over par 215 in 2004.
Mountain West History Lesson
• New Mexico dominated the first four years of the MWC championship, claiming the team title by at least 11 shots in each of the first three years before coming back to defeat UNLV in 2003 by one stroke. The Lady Rebels got their revenge, knocking off the Lobos by two strokes in both 2004 and 2005 to claim the conference championship. UNLV captured its third straight title in 2006, while TCU won by one stroke over BYU in 2007. Playing on their home course, the Lobos topped the Cougars by 19 strokes in the 2008 edition.
• Four different schools have had a player win the individual title, including UNLV (2004, 2005, 2006), New Mexico (2001, 2003, 2007, 2008), Colorado State (2002) and Wyoming (2000).
• The first MWC championship took place at the Sunbrook Golf Club in St. George, Utah. The tournament then moved to Sunriver the next five seasons, however, the first round of the 2003 event was played at the Awbrey Glen Golf Course in Bend, Ore., due to inclement weather.
• The course yardage has topped 6,000 nine times with the longest being 6,312 in 2005.
• New Mexico and UNLV own all but two of the 12 MWC championship records.
Aztec 08-09 Highlights
The Aztec women's golf team has seen solid improvement this season. SDSU has logged five, top-10 finishes in seven events, including two fifth-place performances this spring.
The squad tied the No. 2 all-time low 54-hole score in program history with an 885 at the CU Heather Farr Memorial Invite in September. The Aztecs also posted the sixth and 10th-best 54-hole scores at Fresno State and Hawai'i.
Individually, freshman phenom Malin Enarsson has finished under par in two tournaments to tie for second in school history with a 215 (-1) at both the CU Heather Farr Invite and the Kent Youel Invite. Sophomore Stephanie Arcala, meanwhile, has logged the team's low-round of the season, a 67 at the Hawai'i tournament, which is the best 18 holes by an Aztec since 2003.
MWC Championship Results
Live stats will be provided for this year's MWC championship. The stats will be available on the MWC website (www.themwc.com) or via Golfstat (golfstat.com).
Last Time Out: Cal State Bakersfield In Seaside
In its final event before the Mountain West Conference championship, the Aztec women's golf `B' team downed Cal State Bakersfield by nine strokes with a 36-hole score of 673 (+97) March 31 at the Bayonet and Black Horse Golf Courses in Seaside, Calif.
SDSU had 11 golfers competing in the two-day dual-match with the Roadrunners, with six participating as individuals and the other five able to count their scores toward the team total.
Nine of the 11 Aztecs posted a better second-round score, ranging from a one-stroke improvement to as many as 10 strokes. SDSU sophomore Stephanie Arcala recorded the low round of the day with a 75, shaving seven strokes off her first-round total of 82. Freshman Malin Enarsson had the lowest 36-hole score of 154, followed closely by senior Maki Kamimura, who had a 155.
Three Aztecs tied by carding a 13-over 157, including Arcala and juniors Heather Wilson and Petra Cole. Senior Jakie Kazarian (Dana Point, Calif.) fired a second-round 77, 10 strokes better than her total through the first 18 holes.
Sophomores Samantha Roberts (168), Kaitlen Miyajima (170) and Faith De Guzman (177), junior Ashley Wood (177) and freshman Casey McIntosh (171) rounded out the Aztec contingent in Seaside.
Up Next
The winner of this week's Mountain West Conference championship earns an automatic bid to the NCAA regional tournament. If SDSU claims the MWC title, it will head to the NCAA regionals, May 7-9, in either Tempe, Ariz. (West), Gainesville, Fla., (East) or Columbus, Ohio (Central).
Each of the three regional tournaments will include 21 teams and three individuals, not on those teams. The participants will be selected by the NCAA women's golf committee and are announced on April 27.
The top eight teams and two individuals (not on those teams) from each region will advance to the NCAA championships, May 19-22, in Owings Mills, Md.
Head Coach Felicia Brown
Head coach Felicia Brown is in her seventh season at the helm of the SDSU golf program after serving as an assistant in 2001-02. A native San Diegan, Brown prepped locally at San Marcos High School before playing collegiately at Arizona. She is assisted by Doug Barba for the sixth year in a row.