LAKEWOOD RANCH, Fla. – The Northern Illinois University women's golf team split a pair of matches Tuesday at the MAC Match Play event at the Lakewood Ranch Golf & Country Club to take third place in the 12-team tournament.
The Huskies dropped the morning semifinal match to in-state foe Illinois State by a 3-2 score before rebounding for a 3-1-1 win over Akron in the third-place match.
It was our first tournament since October, so we saw some great shots and some areas we need to clean up with our short game," said NIU head coach
Kim Kester. "Obviously it was good to win two matches here. I like starting with match play, if you have a bad hole, it's just losing one hole, you go on to the next one so you're able to play with more freedom and less pressure."
In the win over Akron,
Caroline Klemp,
Karen Liu and
Ahra Ko each won their matches with Ko and Liu closing out their opponents on the 16
th hole and Klemp doing the same on hole 17.
The morning match versus Illinois State came down to the final match on the course, between
Ahra Ko and Ali Schrock. Trailing by two shots after 16 holes, Ko won the 17th hole and headed to the 18th needing to win the hole to tie the match, but was unable to complete the comeback, sending NIU to the third-place match.
Sophomore
Jasmine Ly dominated her opponent in the morning match, winning 5&4 to earn the win over Maria Toledo Bailey on the 14th hole. Freshman Jóhanna Lúðvíksdóttir defeated her Illinois State opponent, 1UP, by winning the final hole to provide the other NIU win over the Redbirds and complete a 2-0-1 tournament.
NIU is next in action February 28-March 1 at The Gold Rush in Seal Beach, California.
-- NIU --
