Friday, May 19
Phoenix, Ariz.
Baylor
vs
NCAA Championship
No. 12 WGOLF Readies for NCAA Championships
5/18/2023 7:25:00 AM | Women's Golf
BU is making its sixth appearance at the NCAAs in eight seasons
By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
The tried-and-true cliché is that it's not how you start, it's how you finish.
But at the NCAA Championship that begins Friday at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz., the 12th-ranked Baylor women's golf team will try to get out to a good start for the first time since making it to match play back in 2017.
"You can make up for a lot," said junior Rosie Belsham, second on the team with a 71.39-stroke average, "but if you get off to bad start, then it almost puts the top eight (for match play) out of the question. You can get off to a bad start and still make the fourth day of stroke play (top 15), but you've got to have a somewhat mid-table start to be in the (hunt) for match play."
In two previous trips to Grayhawk, the Bears dug too big of a hole in the first round and weren't able to recover in time to compete for a spot in the match play quarterfinals, finishing 14th and 18th, respectively.
"We haven't played our best at Grayhawk," said Baylor coach Jay Goble, whose team advanced to the NCAA Championship for the sixth time in the last eight postseasons, "and I don't know that that's totally to do with anything other than it's just a hard place. I'm going to chalk it up to we just didn't have our good stuff that week. But I do feel like (the) third time's the charm, and we have a good chance this week."
Baylor is coming off a fourth-place finish in the NCAA Pullman Regional, shooting a postseason program-record 11-under 277 in the final round and a 54-hole total of 23-under 841 at Palouse Ridge Golf Club.
Sophomore Sera Hasegawa shot three-straight rounds of 4-under 68 and tied for sixth, while Belsham tied for 13th at 6-under-par 210.
"Not to give too many excuses, but I don't feel like our preparation was perfect," Goble said of trying to get through semester final exams. "But it was really cool to see that we shot better scores every day. . . . This is a culmination of the whole year, so the excitement factor is high to get there. And now, we can kind of freewheel it a little bit."
With Hasegawa and Belsham in the top two spots, the rest of the lineup has freshman Silje Ohma at No. 3, junior Britta Snyder at No. 4 and senior Hannah Karg at No. 5. Belsham, Snyder and Karg are making their third-straight trip to Grayhawk,
"Grayhawk's not like anything we play. I don't think it's like anything anyone plays," said Belsham, who tied for 53rd at the 2021 NCAA Championship as a freshman. "It's by far the hardest golf course we play all year. Which, as Jay has said all year, we really do play well on the hard golf courses."
As opposed to the Pullman Regional, where it was "almost like you can't make enough" birdies," Goble said, "we tend to like the courses better where birdie is really great and pars are really great. I think that's a little bit more Grayhawk-style."
One of the things that makes it difficult, Goble said, is that it requires you to hit the fairways off the tee box and be in a favorable position for your approach shots.
"It's not always about going at the pin at Grayhawk," he said. "It's about putting it in the position to make the best score that you can. That is a hard mindset sometimes for people to get over is that they hit it in the fairway (and) they want to go right at the pin. And that's not always the case at Grayhawk. Sometimes, 15 feet left of the flag or 15 feet short of the flag is a better plan than being ultra-aggressive."
Paired with Texas and Northwestern for the first two days, Baylor will tee off with the afternoon wave on Friday, starting at 2:47 p.m. CT off No. 1. And then, the Bears will be part of the morning groupings for Saturday's second round.
"I think we have a big advantage over a lot of teams because we've been there a lot of times," Belsham said. "We're kind of a little superstitious, and we get the other side of the draw this year – afternoon (in the first round) and morning (in the second round), which we're all very excited about. Maybe we'll break the first-round curse."
A transfer from East Tennessee State playing in her first postseason tournaments, Hasegaway is averaging 70.79 per round and is on pace to shatter Baylor's single-season stroke-average record (71.97).
"It's the first time for me in the nationals," Hasegawa said, "so it's exciting but at the same time a little nervous, because I really want to go to match play in the championship. . . . It's the last tournament of the season, so we are excited being here. At the same time, we are perfectly ready for the competition at nationals. Hopefully, we make more birdies and keep patient."
Along with Hasegawa, Ohma is making her first trip to Grayhawk. Shooting 3-under 69 in the final round, Ohma tied for 26th in the Pullman Regional at 2-under 213.
Snyder and Karg are both making their third appearance in the NCAA Championship at Grayhawk, finishing tied for 59th and 79th, respectively, for their best finishes in 2021.
"I think we have one of the best teams in the country," Goble said. "Do we get out there and have our great stuff? I hope so. That's what we're planning on. I think we take it one day at a time, play our game. And if we do, we'll have a good shot to make match play and make a run."
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. – Baylor women's golf returns to familiar territory as it opens its third-straight NCAA Championship at Grayhawk Golf Club on Friday morning.
On top of having four players on the trip that have played at Grayhawk, the Bears have played three tournaments in the Phoenix area this spring. Head coach Jay Goble feels like the experience in Arizona can only help them going into the NCAAs.
"Yeah, we played out in Arizona a couple times," he said. "I think that we're also trying to play against great competition on hard golf courses, which is also super important. We tend to like the courses better where a birdie is really, really great and pars are really, really great, which is a little bit more Grayhawk style. We have not played in this wave that we're playing in this year, teeing off in the afternoon and then the morning in the second round. I feel good about our chances to play good in those two rounds and get off to a good start."
With a stroke average of 70.79 this season, Sera Hasegawa enters the NCAA Championships on pace to break Baylor's single-season stroke-average record by more than a full shot (71.97). The sophomore transfer is ready to go out with a bang in her first season with the Bears.
"It's the last tournament of the season, so we are excited to be there," she said. "At the same time, we are perfectly ready for the competition at the nationals. Hopefully, we make more birdies and stay patient."
Junior Rosie Belsham will make her third appearance at Grayhawk, with her best finish coming in 2021 when she tied for 59th as a freshman. The junior is in the midst of the best season of her career, boasting a stroke average of 71.39 and a par or better percentage of 84.1%, both of which will be tested on a difficult course like Grayhawk.
"Grayhawk's not like anything we play, I don't think it's like anything anyone plays," Belsham said. "It's by far the hardest golf course we play all year, which as Jay (Goble) has said all year, we really do play well on the hard golf courses. But, I think we'll do well."
Silje Ohma will make her first trip to Grayhawk. The freshman finished tied for 26th in her first NCAA appearance in Pullman and enters Grayhawk leading the team in birdie or better percentage (20.8%), total birdies (97) and total eagles (8).
Hannah Karg will make her third and final appearance at Grayhawk, with her best finish coming in 2021 when she finished 79th. With a stroke average of 73.04, Karg is enjoying the best season of her career and is on pace to finish with a top-10 career stroke average in program history (74.13).
BaiMai Seema enters Grayhawk, with 13 team rounds this season, with a team-leading 92.3% of them counting towards the team score. Seema has competitive experience at Grayhawk making her debut as a freshman substitute in the third round in 2022.
Britta Snyder is making her third trip to Grayhawk, with her best finish coming in 2021 when she finished 59th. Snyder's lowest round of the season came in the Phoenix area, when she shot a 5-under 67 at the Match in the Desert in January.
The Bears will tee off beginning at 2:47 p.m. CT Friday, playing alongside Texas and Northwestern. The full lineup will be determined on Thursday evening.
Once available, pairings, live stats and scoring will be available at Golfstat.com. For more information on Baylor Women's Golf, follow @BaylorWGolf on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
Baylor Bear Insider
The tried-and-true cliché is that it's not how you start, it's how you finish.
But at the NCAA Championship that begins Friday at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz., the 12th-ranked Baylor women's golf team will try to get out to a good start for the first time since making it to match play back in 2017.
"You can make up for a lot," said junior Rosie Belsham, second on the team with a 71.39-stroke average, "but if you get off to bad start, then it almost puts the top eight (for match play) out of the question. You can get off to a bad start and still make the fourth day of stroke play (top 15), but you've got to have a somewhat mid-table start to be in the (hunt) for match play."
In two previous trips to Grayhawk, the Bears dug too big of a hole in the first round and weren't able to recover in time to compete for a spot in the match play quarterfinals, finishing 14th and 18th, respectively.
"We haven't played our best at Grayhawk," said Baylor coach Jay Goble, whose team advanced to the NCAA Championship for the sixth time in the last eight postseasons, "and I don't know that that's totally to do with anything other than it's just a hard place. I'm going to chalk it up to we just didn't have our good stuff that week. But I do feel like (the) third time's the charm, and we have a good chance this week."
Baylor is coming off a fourth-place finish in the NCAA Pullman Regional, shooting a postseason program-record 11-under 277 in the final round and a 54-hole total of 23-under 841 at Palouse Ridge Golf Club.
Sophomore Sera Hasegawa shot three-straight rounds of 4-under 68 and tied for sixth, while Belsham tied for 13th at 6-under-par 210.
"Not to give too many excuses, but I don't feel like our preparation was perfect," Goble said of trying to get through semester final exams. "But it was really cool to see that we shot better scores every day. . . . This is a culmination of the whole year, so the excitement factor is high to get there. And now, we can kind of freewheel it a little bit."
With Hasegawa and Belsham in the top two spots, the rest of the lineup has freshman Silje Ohma at No. 3, junior Britta Snyder at No. 4 and senior Hannah Karg at No. 5. Belsham, Snyder and Karg are making their third-straight trip to Grayhawk,
"Grayhawk's not like anything we play. I don't think it's like anything anyone plays," said Belsham, who tied for 53rd at the 2021 NCAA Championship as a freshman. "It's by far the hardest golf course we play all year. Which, as Jay has said all year, we really do play well on the hard golf courses."
As opposed to the Pullman Regional, where it was "almost like you can't make enough" birdies," Goble said, "we tend to like the courses better where birdie is really great and pars are really great. I think that's a little bit more Grayhawk-style."
One of the things that makes it difficult, Goble said, is that it requires you to hit the fairways off the tee box and be in a favorable position for your approach shots.
"It's not always about going at the pin at Grayhawk," he said. "It's about putting it in the position to make the best score that you can. That is a hard mindset sometimes for people to get over is that they hit it in the fairway (and) they want to go right at the pin. And that's not always the case at Grayhawk. Sometimes, 15 feet left of the flag or 15 feet short of the flag is a better plan than being ultra-aggressive."
Paired with Texas and Northwestern for the first two days, Baylor will tee off with the afternoon wave on Friday, starting at 2:47 p.m. CT off No. 1. And then, the Bears will be part of the morning groupings for Saturday's second round.
"I think we have a big advantage over a lot of teams because we've been there a lot of times," Belsham said. "We're kind of a little superstitious, and we get the other side of the draw this year – afternoon (in the first round) and morning (in the second round), which we're all very excited about. Maybe we'll break the first-round curse."
A transfer from East Tennessee State playing in her first postseason tournaments, Hasegaway is averaging 70.79 per round and is on pace to shatter Baylor's single-season stroke-average record (71.97).
"It's the first time for me in the nationals," Hasegawa said, "so it's exciting but at the same time a little nervous, because I really want to go to match play in the championship. . . . It's the last tournament of the season, so we are excited being here. At the same time, we are perfectly ready for the competition at nationals. Hopefully, we make more birdies and keep patient."
Along with Hasegawa, Ohma is making her first trip to Grayhawk. Shooting 3-under 69 in the final round, Ohma tied for 26th in the Pullman Regional at 2-under 213.
Snyder and Karg are both making their third appearance in the NCAA Championship at Grayhawk, finishing tied for 59th and 79th, respectively, for their best finishes in 2021.
"I think we have one of the best teams in the country," Goble said. "Do we get out there and have our great stuff? I hope so. That's what we're planning on. I think we take it one day at a time, play our game. And if we do, we'll have a good shot to make match play and make a run."
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. – Baylor women's golf returns to familiar territory as it opens its third-straight NCAA Championship at Grayhawk Golf Club on Friday morning.
On top of having four players on the trip that have played at Grayhawk, the Bears have played three tournaments in the Phoenix area this spring. Head coach Jay Goble feels like the experience in Arizona can only help them going into the NCAAs.
"Yeah, we played out in Arizona a couple times," he said. "I think that we're also trying to play against great competition on hard golf courses, which is also super important. We tend to like the courses better where a birdie is really, really great and pars are really, really great, which is a little bit more Grayhawk style. We have not played in this wave that we're playing in this year, teeing off in the afternoon and then the morning in the second round. I feel good about our chances to play good in those two rounds and get off to a good start."
With a stroke average of 70.79 this season, Sera Hasegawa enters the NCAA Championships on pace to break Baylor's single-season stroke-average record by more than a full shot (71.97). The sophomore transfer is ready to go out with a bang in her first season with the Bears.
"It's the last tournament of the season, so we are excited to be there," she said. "At the same time, we are perfectly ready for the competition at the nationals. Hopefully, we make more birdies and stay patient."
Junior Rosie Belsham will make her third appearance at Grayhawk, with her best finish coming in 2021 when she tied for 59th as a freshman. The junior is in the midst of the best season of her career, boasting a stroke average of 71.39 and a par or better percentage of 84.1%, both of which will be tested on a difficult course like Grayhawk.
"Grayhawk's not like anything we play, I don't think it's like anything anyone plays," Belsham said. "It's by far the hardest golf course we play all year, which as Jay (Goble) has said all year, we really do play well on the hard golf courses. But, I think we'll do well."
Silje Ohma will make her first trip to Grayhawk. The freshman finished tied for 26th in her first NCAA appearance in Pullman and enters Grayhawk leading the team in birdie or better percentage (20.8%), total birdies (97) and total eagles (8).
Hannah Karg will make her third and final appearance at Grayhawk, with her best finish coming in 2021 when she finished 79th. With a stroke average of 73.04, Karg is enjoying the best season of her career and is on pace to finish with a top-10 career stroke average in program history (74.13).
BaiMai Seema enters Grayhawk, with 13 team rounds this season, with a team-leading 92.3% of them counting towards the team score. Seema has competitive experience at Grayhawk making her debut as a freshman substitute in the third round in 2022.
Britta Snyder is making her third trip to Grayhawk, with her best finish coming in 2021 when she finished 59th. Snyder's lowest round of the season came in the Phoenix area, when she shot a 5-under 67 at the Match in the Desert in January.
The Bears will tee off beginning at 2:47 p.m. CT Friday, playing alongside Texas and Northwestern. The full lineup will be determined on Thursday evening.
Once available, pairings, live stats and scoring will be available at Golfstat.com. For more information on Baylor Women's Golf, follow @BaylorWGolf on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
—BaylorBears.com—
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