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Cavaliers Set to Open Play at NCAA Championships Friday
Story Links
May 21, 2015
Charlottesville, Va. – The No. 18 Virginia women’s golf team opens play at the NCAA Championships Friday, May 22 at the par-72, 6,468-yard Concession Golf Club in Bradenton, Fla. The Cavaliers tee off starting at 8:36 a.m. from the 10th tee and are paired with Wake Forest and Tennessee. Those same schools will play the second round starting from the first tee at 1:06 p.m. Saturday.
This year’s championship features a new format that will incorporate match play to determine the team winner after previous NCAA Championships relied on 72 holes of stroke play to crown individual and team champions.
All 24 teams and 12 individuals will complete 54 holes of stroke play (Friday-Sunday). Following 54-holes of competition the top 15 teams, along with the top nine individuals not on an advancing team, will advance for one additional day (Monday) of stroke play to determine the top eight teams for match play competition and the 72-hole stroke-play individual champion.
The top eight teams after 72 holes of stroke play will be placed into a bracket for the match play portion of the tournament, which takes place Tuesday (quarterfinals and semifinals) and Wednesday (finals).
Also new to the event will be extensive live coverage on The Golf Channel:
May 25 Final Round, Individual Stroke Play – 4-7 p.m. ET
May 26 Quarterfinals, Match Play – 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. ET
May 26 Semifinals, Match Play – 3:30-7 p.m. ET
May 27 Finals, Match Play – 3-7 p.m. ET
UVa advanced to the NCAA Championships after finishing fifth at the NCAA Regional site in St. George, Utah. Virginia is making its eighth appearance at the NCAAs in the 12-year history of the program. Last year the Cavaliers placed 14th at the Tulsa (Okla.) Country Club, led by freshman Laure Diaz-Yi’s 28th-place showing. Virginia had back-to-back fourth-place finishes in 2011 and 2012. The top individual performance came in 2005 when Leah Wigger placed second in Sunriver, Ore.
Live scoring for the tournament will be on NCAASports.com.
Virginia’s lineup for the NCAAs will include senior Briana Mao (Folsom, Calif.), juniors Lauren Coughlin (Chesapeake, Va.), Elizabeth Szokol (Winnetka, Ill.), sophomore Lauren Diaz-Yi (Thousand Oaks, Calif.) and freshman Lyberty Anderson (Chesterfield, Va.). Mao, Coughlin and Diaz-Yi all earned All-ACC honors this season after helping the Cavaliers to their first ACC championship.
The field for this year’s tournament includes: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Baylor, California, Campbell, Duke, LSU, NC State, Northwestern, Purdue, South Carolina, Stanford, Tennessee, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Tulane, UC Davis, UCLA, UNLV, USC, Virginia, Wake Forest and Washington. Duke won the 2014 team title.