Alabama Women’s Golf in 16th Place After Round 1 of NCAA Tournament

The University of Alabama women's golf team carded 25-over 305 in the opening round of the NCAA Championships Tuesday to tie for 16^th place at the par-70 6,194-yard Tulsa Country Club.

The Crimson Tide is 17-shots back of Oklahoma who has the overnight lead at 8-over 288. The Tide is just five shots out of the top 10. UCLA is second at 11-over 291 while Duke, Arizona State and Southern California tied for third at 13-over 293.

“It would have been real easy to give up and pack it in today,” Alabama head coach Mic Potter said. “But everyone did the best they could, they saved all of the shots they could and in the end that is going to be important. This tournament has only just begun, we don’t know what the conditions will be, but we have to be ready for anything. Hopefully they now know they have to be ready for anything.”

Conditions at the Tulsa Country Club were challenging to say the least in Tuesday’s opening round. Wind gusts over 40 mile per hour wrecked havoc with the entire field and tested Alabama’s young squad.

“I would say the wind was pretty steady at 25-30 mph and gusting to over 40 mph,” Potter said. “We didn’t execute the way I would like us to – we have to hit better shots – but the execution is not from mechanics, it is from not trusting our swings. Hopefully we can go out there tomorrow and every player on our team can make a plan, trust their swing, give it their best and be happy with that.”

Sophomore Janie Jackson paced the Alabama attack with a 5-over 75. She tied for 41^st place, eight shots off the lead of USC’s Doris Chen, Denver’s Tonje Daffinrud and Stanford’s Lauren Kim. Stephanie Meadow is one shot back of Jackson in a tie for 54^th at 6-over 76.

Sophomore Emma Talley and freshman Mia Landegren both carded 7-over 77s and are tied for 70^th. Redshirt freshman Cammie Gray’s 79 was dropped from the Alabama team score and she is tied for 91^st.

Alabama will once again be paired with Washington and South Carolina in the second round. The group is slated to begin teeing off at 8:25 a.m. (CDT) on Wednesday.