Women's golf team earns five top-five finishes

By: Colleen Watson

Posted: 3/12/08

Fresh off of a second-place finish against 14 other teams at the Spartan Invitational last week, the Spartans' women's golf team is teeing up to take another swing at the Western Athletic Conference Championship this year.

Sophomore Christina Corpus, who has played on the team the past two years, finished fifth out of more than 90 women at the Spartan invitational.

"It's our home course," she said. "I wanted to win it, but I came up short."

The Spartans are ranked 36th in the nation according to Golfstat.com and they have finished in the top five, five times in the last six tournaments they have played this year.

"This group is pretty consistent," said head coach John Dormann, who is in his third season as head coach. "We don't have a lot of highs, but we don't have a lot of lows either."

There are three more tournaments before the postseason: two in Arizona and one at Stanford.

Dormann said the Arizona State Invitational coming up in April was one tournament they were especially looking forward to.

"Many of the top twenty teams in the country will be playing there," he said. "So it's an opportunity to see where we stand."

All six of the team members said they are confident that they could win the WAC this year. Last year, the team lost in the WAC Championship by one stroke.

"Our experience last year kind of gave some of us more drive to do better," said junior Erika Moston, a second-team All-Western Athletic Conference choice during the 2005-2006 season.

"We know we can do it, we know we can get there," Moston said. "We want to win the WAC and then go to regional. And we definitely want to go to nationals."

In February the women finished fifth out of 12 teams at the Qdoba Invitational in Florida.

Moston finished second at the Qdoba Invitational earlier this year, scoring under par two of the three rounds.

There are no seniors on the team, and Moston is the only junior. She is accompanied by two sophomores and three freshmen.

Five women compete in a tournament with four of the lowest scores counted towards the team's total. Most tournaments are three rounds, which equal 54 holes, Dormann said.

"Really, our two top players are Erica Moston and Christina Corpus," Dormann said. "They're our two most consistent players, but anybody can be our best player in any given round."

Kanika Minocha, a sophomore, said, "Even though we're really young, I think we'll do well because we're really strong together."

Rounding out the team are freshmen Katrina Delen-Briones and Ayla Friga, and sophomore Kimberly Punyasavatsut.

The Spartans will participate in the Mountain View Collegiate Tournament, in Tucson, Ariz. on Saturday, March 29.