April 8, 2015
SAN DIEGO - The 22nd-ranked San Diego State women's golf team once again faces one of the nation's top fields this weekend when it competes in the PING/ASU Invitational, April 10-12, at the par-72, 6,223-yard Karsten Golf Course in Tempe, Arizona. The first and second rounds will commence with double tee times on Friday and Saturday at 8 a.m. PDT, while the final 18 holes will be contested on Sunday beginning at 7:30 a.m.
The elite 15-team tournament features seven squads ranked among the top 10 in the latest Golfstat.com index, including No. 1 Southern California, No. 2 Washington, No. 3 UCLA, No. 4 South Carolina, No. 5 Duke, No. 7 Arkansas and No. 8 Arizona. In addition, the Aztecs will get an early look at Mountain West rival and No. 16 UNLV prior to the conference championships, while No. 19 Stanford, No. 25 Arizona State, No. 28 Baylor, No. 29 Alabama, No. 44 Texas and No. 58 Oklahoma round out the impressive list of competing schools.
SDSU will be paired with Texas and UNLV during the opening round, with a live scoring link courtesy of Golfstat available on GoAztecs.com.
Fourth-year head coach Leslie Spalding will accompany six golfers to the Valley of the Sun, including the starting lineup of Emma Henrikson (Malmö, Sweden), Sirene Blair (South Jordan, Utah), Mila Chaves (Asuncion, Paraguay), Paige Spiranac (Scottsdale, Arizona) and Georgia Lacey (Del Mar, Calif.), while Haleigh Krause (Eugene, Ore.) will participate as an unattached player.
Henrikson, who leads the team with a 73.44 scoring average in 18 rounds of medal play this season, enters the weekend at No. 52 in the latest Golfstat Cup standings, while Blair (73.94) checks in at No. 85.
The Aztecs have been idle since March 25 after finishing third at their home tournament, the SDSU Farms Invitational, in Rancho Santa Fe, California. The Scarlet and Black posted a 3-1 record in four rounds of match play, defeating Long Beach State, UNLV and Arizona State, while falling short against eventual champion Tennessee.
Prior to the Farms event, SDSU last competed in stroke play on March 3 at the Bruin Wave Invitational in Westlake Village, California, where it logged a fourth-place finish at El Caballero Country Club. Blair tied for second on the individual leaderboard with a 5-over 221 after the first two rounds were plagued by intermittent rain showers. With her effort, the Aztec sophomore registered her third top-five finish of the year en route to earning Mountain West Women's Golfer of the Week honors.
SDSU last competed at the PING/ASU Invitational in 2012, when it placed 16th in the team standings at 63-over 915, while Malin Enarsson was the Aztecs' top individual, tying for the 32nd spot with a combined 10-over 223.
South Carolina is the defending team champion after posting an 11-under 853 in 2014 to hold off Washington (-5), Arizona State (-5) and Duke (-5) by six strokes, while Arizona (+4) finished a distant fifth. In addition, Duke junior Celine Boutier looks to capture medalist honors for the second straight year after carding an 8-under 208 last season.
Following this weekend's tournament, San Diego State will have 10 days to prepare for the Mountain West Championships, slated for April 20-22 at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California.