Unlike regionals, Vanderbilt women start strong to take NCAA Championship lead
Vanderbilt opened its NCAA regional a couple weeks ago in 13 over.
The Commodores got off to a much better start Friday, shooting 6 under to take a two-shot lead after the first round of the NCAA Division I Women's Golf Championship at Omni La Costa in Carlsbad, California.
Oklahoma State sits second at 4 under as the Cowboys, like Vanderbilt, teed off in the morning wave, which consisted of the lower-ranked squads in the 30-team field. Florida also played early and shot even par, where it is tied with top-10 programs Oregon, Texas and Arizona State.
'I thought the girls did a nice job of bringing the momentum that we had the last two rounds in Lexington with us,' said Vanderbilt head coach Greg Allen, whose Commodores set a new program low at nationals thanks in large part to 3-under 69s from Ava Merrill and Tillie Claggett. 'It's really nice to take advantage of the morning tee time and get off to a good start. … It's still super early, so we understand there's a lot of golf left, and we just need to embrace the leaderboard and where we're at.'
Vanderbilt's five players also combined for just one double bogey or worse.
Further down the leaderboard, top-ranked Stanford is tied for 11th at 5 over. The Cardinal, which haven't lost a stroke-play competition since prior to last year's Pac-12 Championship, threw out a 77 from Annika Award finalist Meja Ortengren. No. 4 Florida State, which boasts the top two amateurs in the world in Mirabel Ting and Lottie Woad, shares 16th at 7 over. Ting and Woad shot 2-under 70 and even-par 72, respectively.
No. 2 Arkansas and No. 3 South Carolina each opened in 9 over, good only for T-21, while No. 7 Wake Forest is beating just three teams at 16 over. Gamecocks senior Hannah Darling, who was subbed out after an opening 84 at last year's NCAA Championship but bounced back this season to be ranked 12th nationally, shot 82 on Friday and is ahead of just three players.
Tennessee's Bailey Davis carded just one bogey while shooting 5-under 67. She leads Texas' Lauren Kim, USC's Catherine Park and LSU's Elsa Svensson.
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