BATON ROUGE — After meeting some of the past history of the LSU golf programs at the golf reunion weekend, the 2006-07 women’s golf team takes to the course Monday at Hanahan, S.C., for the first event of the 28th season of LSU women’s golf.
The 19th-ranked Lady Tigers will open the season for the third straight year in the Cougar Classic hosted by the College of Charleston at the Yeamans Hall Course. The 18 teams will play 36 holes on Monday and then the final 18 holes on Tuesday. It’s the start of a busy week for the women’s team as they will return after the final round of this tournament Tuesday night and then Wednesday night head for the Mason Rudolph Classic in Nashville this Friday through Sunday.
Joining LSU and host Charleston are Alabama, Campbell, Florida State, Furman, Georgia State, Kentucky, Maryland, Miami, Mississippi State, North Carolina Greensboro, North Carolina State, North Carolina, Notre Dame, Richmond, South Florida and Tennessee.
LSU won the event in 2004 in their first appearance here and in 2005, after only a few days of practice after the delays caused by Hurricane Katrina, finished seventh.
Coach Karen Bahnsen will go with a familiar lineup after qualifying rounds last week. Senior Melissa Eaton, who has averaged 75.0 (second best in 2005, team best in 2006) that last two years, along with her twin sister Nicola and the junior trio of Rebecca Kuhn, Kim Meck and Alexis Rather. Melissa Eaton, Kuhn, Meck and Rather were all on the playing squad that finished second in the NCAA East Regional and then advanced to last year’s NCAA Division I Championships.
“We are excited about starting the season and continuing the tradition of LSU golf that the girls got to see this weekend from our former players,” said LSU Coach Karen Bahnsen, the first recruit of the women’s program in 1979 and now entering her 23rd season as the head coach of the Lady Tigers. “We are happy with being recognized nationally, but we have to play well to keep that. But we don’t want to put to much pressure on ourselves now, because as always it is what happens in the spring that is most important. We want to play well and improve as the fall goes along.”
Live scoring for the first tournament of the fall season can be found at www.golfstat.com.