Feb. 24, 2014

Photo Gallery 

PEORIA, Ariz. – On the third and final round of the Westbrook Spring Invitational, the Illinois women’s golf team displayed some fight and recorded their best round as a team, tallying a 290 (+2).  As a result, the Illini finished in eighth place in the 14-team field with an 875 total. The +11 score tied the second lowest 54-hole team tournament total in program history. 

The Illini’s third round total of 290 tied for the fourth best score of the day, topping the likes of ranked opponents #22 Oregon, #53 College of Charleston and #65 Oregon State.  Illinois finished two strokes ahead of Iowa in the final standings and one stroke behind Indiana.

“We didn’t get it going.  The opportunities were out there but we didn’t take advantage of them,” said Illinois head coach Renee Slone.  We needed to play aggressively especially on the greens but struggled in adopting that mindset and playing with that.  To make putts we needed to hit firmly but we didn’t capitalize”.

Freshman Stephanie Miller shot a 72 to lead the Orange and Blue with a grand total of 213 (-3) placing sixth individually. Thus, Miller did not shoot one round over part at Westbrook. Furthermore, Miller tied the sixth lowest 54-hole tournament total in Illinois history, a mark she previously achieved when she won the Diane Thomason Invitational. 

Both Ember Schdult and Sam Postillion shot their best rounds of the tournament today, recording a one under par and even par round, respectively. Schudlt finished in a tie for 18^th with a 217 (+1) total while Postillion’s 221 (+5) put the redshirt junior in 39^th place. In addition, Schuldt's +2 finish was a career low for the senior. 

Erin Ahern displayed great growth on the golfcourse over the two-day tournament. Ahern shot a personal best 224 (+8), an improvement of 11 strokes from her previous low. Ahern also shot a career best low round of 74. 

“We’ve got a couple weeks here to prepare for the next event and get ourselves in the frame of mind that is needed to make the best of our abilities,” added Slone.

Big Ten opponent #34 Ohio State won the Westbrook Invitational with a record-breaking score of 838 (-26).  The record was previously held by Illinois when they won the competition in 2012 (853, -11).  Second and third place were taken by #22 Oregon Ducks (848, -16) and #40 Wisconsin Badgers (859, -5).

The Illini will return to action on March 14-16 as they take part in the Insperity Lady Jaguar tournament in Augusta, Ga.