SAN DIEGO – The San Diego State women's golf team returns to the fairways early next week when it participates in the Wildcat Invitational, March 11-12, at Sewailo Golf Club in Tucson, Ariz.
The first two rounds of the 54-hole event will commence on Monday with a 7:30 a.m. MST/PDT shotgun start, while the final 18 holes are slated for completion on Tuesday with another shotgun start at 8 a.m. A live scoring link for both days will be available on GoAztecs.com courtesy of Golfstat.
The Aztecs are among eight schools in the highly competitive-team field ranked among the Golfstat top 75 this week. Along with tournament host Arizona (9), No. 53 San Diego State will battle the likes of Arizona State (17), Purdue (25), Oregon State (31), Oregon (32), Iowa State (43) and Michigan (63). In addition, the Scarlet and Black will be afforded an early look at Mountain West rivals Fresno State, New Mexico and UNLV, while Denver, Grand Canyon, Iowa, Long Beach State, New Mexico State and Northern Arizona round out the list of competing squads.
For SDSU's second spring event, head coach Leslie Spalding will employ the starting lineup of Gioia Carpinelli (Boppelsen, Switzerland), Fernanda Escauriza (Asunción, Paraguay), Sara Kjellker (Hollviken, Sweden), Kitty Tam (Hong Kong, China) and Daniela Anastasi (La Jolla, Calif.).
Carpinelli and Escauriza tied for third on the individual leaderboard in their last outing at the Bruin Wave Invitational in San Luis Obispo, Calif., where they completed the tournament at 8-over 224, as the Aztecs finished sixth in the team standings with a combined 50-over 914.
Escauriza was one of just eight golfers in the field of 78 players to post a red figure during the week after shooting a 1-under 71 in the opening round, while Carpinelli mustered an even-par 72 in round two.
For the season, Carpinelli leads the Scarlet and Black with a 72.78 scoring average, while Kjellker (73.28) and Escauriza (74.44) rank second and third, respectively.
In addition, Tam (76.25) will make her second consecutive appearance and fifth of the year, while Anastasi (76.67) earns her first start of the spring after competing in four events last fall, including a pair of starts at the Branch/McGuire Invitational and the Windy City Collegiate Classic.
San Diego State will partake in the Wildcat Invitational for the first time since coach Spalding's first year at the helm of the Aztecs in February of 2012, when the tournament was conducted at the recently shuttered Golf Club at Vistoso in Oro Valley, Ariz. SDSU (+63) finished ninth as a team, while former Aztec standout Christine Wong (+8) tied for 16th individually.
With defending champion UCLA skipping this year's edition, the 2019 Wildcat Invitational will feature different team and individual winners after the Bruins' Lilia Vu captured medalist honors in 2018 with a 14-under 202.
Arizona, which finished nine shots behind UCLA with a collective 8-under 856, is the top returning school, while Long Beach State (+17) finished a distant fourth, followed by Purdue (+22) and UNLV (+22), which tied for fifth.
Yu-Sang Hou of the host Wildcats is the top returning individual after finishing alone in fifth last year with a 5-under 211, while LBSU's Holland Shourds (8th, -1), UNLV's Nastasia Kossacky (T-12th, +1) and New Mexico's Darian Zachek (T-12th, +1) are likely back in the mix again this season, along with another pair of Arizona golfers in Haley Moore (T-14th, +2) and Bianca Pagdanganan (T-14th, +2).
Following the Wildcat Invitational, the Aztecs will have two weeks to prepare for their sole home tournament of the year at the Lamkin Invitational, March 25-27, at The Farms Golf Club in Rancho Santa Fe, Calif.