BATON ROUGE — After “Geauxing Pink” in the annual college-am Thursday in a benefit to raise awareness for breast cancer, the LSU women’s golf team gets down to business looking to bring the championship of the LSU/Cleveland Golf Classic back to Baton Rouge.
The 54-hole LSU/Cleveland Golf Classic begins Friday at 8 a.m. at the University Club. The LSU Tigers will tee off shortly after 9 a.m. off the first tee in the final wave of the opening day. A single 18-hole round will be played each day through the conclusion of the 54-hole tournament on Sunday.
A total of 17 teams will take part in the event hosted by LSU, the 26th-ranked Lady Tigers are joined by 13 ranked teams. The entire field includes: Alabama (44), Augusta State (43), Central Florida (44), Charleston 936), Florida State, Georgia (13), Kentucky, Louisville (27), Mississippi State , Ole Miss, North Carolina (34), North Carolina State (41), North Carolina Wilmington (40), South Carolina (29), Vanderbilt (22), Virginia (28) and Wake Forest (10).
Duke won last year’s event as Amanda Blumenherst won the individual competition with a 54-hole Cleveland Classic record nine under par.
LSU has won the event seven times since the inaugural event at the old Fairwood Country Club in Baton Rouge in 1982, including three times since the event moved to the U-Club in 2000. LSU’s last win was in 2005.
“This is a very good field and we are looking forward to getting things started,” said LSU Coach Karen Bahnsen said. “The weather should be great for the entire three days and we are really excited about our chance to play a tournament again on our home course.”
LSU has had some good scores in its opening two events and looks to capitalize on that now that it has returned home to the University Club. LSU will go with the lineup it has played in the spring events including freshman Megan McChrystal who shot 5-under in the final two rounds of the Central Florida tournament earlier this week.
Joining McCrystal will be seniors Rebecca Kuhn and Alexis Rather, freshman Amalie Valle and junior Caroline Martens. Four other Lady Tigers ? Lindy LaBauve, Nicole Crochet, Kim Meck and Abby Obertheir ? will play as individual competitors.
“Our lineup has been very good for us so far this spring,” said Bahnsen. “We finished second in Puerto Rico and posted three good rounds under 300 at Central Florida. We feel very good about where our team is now and this is the time for us to come through with some very good rounds on our home course. It won’t be easy. This is a very strong feel and everyone is looking forward to the challenge.”
Live scoring for the event can be found through www.LSUsports.net and at www.golfstat.com.