MOBILE, Ala. - University of South Alabama women's golf will compete in the 2010 Sun Belt Conference Championship Mon., April 19-Wed., April 21, at The Shoals, part of the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail, in Muscle Shoals, Ala.
USA will compete on the par-72, 6,100-yard School Master Course at The Shoals.
"The course is a similar style to the Robert Trent Jones course we practice on at Magnolia Grove," USA head coach T.J. Jackson said. "The greens are Bentgrass greens, and we have Bermuda greens in Mobile. It's a different surface than what we're used to practicing on, but it shouldn't make a difference. As long as we're focused, we should putt well. If we just get out there and focus on good targets and execute like we're capable of doing, then we'll play well."
The Lady Jaguars enter the SBC Championship with three top-five finishes this season, including a season-best performance at the Samford Women's Collegiate in mid-March, where USA tied for second place with a season-best team total of 910. The Lady Jags shot carded a season-low round of 296 in the second round at Samford, behind freshman Fanny Eineren who won the individual title with a 2-under-par total of 216.
USA finished third at the 2009 Lady Red Wolves Classic in Jonesboro, Ark., in October, with a two-round total score of 629. The Lady Jags placed fifth at the Troy Women's Invitational with a two-round score of 620.
"We've had some decent tournaments coming into this event, and what we have to do is take all of the positives out of it and put all of the negatives behind us and focus on this tournament,"Jackson said. "We can't put any more weight on it just because it's the conference tournament. That would put more pressure on us, so we're going to go out there and do our job. We have to eliminate mistakes, and if we're hitting fairways and greens, making our short putts and are efficient with our putting and short games, then we will have done our job. That's the approach we have to have."
Eineren leads the Lady Jags into this year's conference championship with a 77.14 scoring average, which ranks 17th in the Sun Belt. The Kullavik, Sweden, native has earned three top-five finishes this season. Eineren earned her first collegiate top-five finish with a third-place finish at the 2009 Lady Red Wolf Classic, and followed with a tie for fourth at Troy before winning the Samford Women's Collegiate this spring behind a season-low round of 69.
USA senior Claudia Wolf enters the championship with a 77.92 scoring average, which ranks 26th in the SBC. Wolf earned a top-five finish at Troy with a 5-over-par 149. The Igls, Austria, native has earned three top-10 finishes this season, and recorded her best round of the season with an even-par 72 at the Lady Jaguar Invitational.
South Alabama will look to Eineren, Wolf, Ana Garcia, Nina Offenberg and Sarah-Louise Winter to compete for this year's conference title. USA sophomore Anna Sellen-Runefjell's status for the championship is questionable, due to illness.
USA will be first off the tee with Western Kentucky at 7:30 a.m. Monday morning to open the championship.
Live scoring for the 2010 Sun Belt Conference Championship can be accessed by clicking here.
For more information about South Alabama athletics, check back with www.usajaguars.com. Season tickets for all Jaguar athletic events can be purchased by calling (251) 461-1USA (1872).
-USA-
