Latanna Stone The Winner In The Bahamas; LSU Best Round of Day To Finish Second

BATON ROUGE – LSU senior women’s golfer Latanna Stone made her ninth top-five finish the best of her college career Wednesday, finishing as the individual champion with a dominating final two rounds in the Nexus Collegiate at the Albany Golf Club in New Providence, Bahamas.

Stone shot rounds of 68 and 70 over the final 36 holes after an opening round of even par 72 to finish the 54-hole event at 6-under par 210, winning the individual title by five shots over Lauren Walsh from Wake Forest. Walsh was in second behind Stone entering the final day and her 1-over 73 left her at -1 215 for the tournament (75-67-73).

Those two were the only golfers in the field of 63 to break par on the course where the PGA Hero World Championship is contested each December.

LSU as a team posted the best round of the day, a 2-over 290, on a day when eight of the 10 teams were double digit over par as the No. 9 Tigers finished in second place behind only Wake Forest.

LSU finished at 18-over 882 with rounds of 305, 287 and 290. No. 2 Wake Forest finished as winner with an 11-over total of 875 (296-280-299). Arizona State, ranked 13th, was third at 885 (21-over) and Auburn finished fourth at 890.

Stone’s final round started with bogeys on the second and fourth holes, dropping her back to 2-under for the tournament but she never lost control of the lead in the tournament. She then birdied four par four holes in the final 12 holes, the seventh, the 13th, the 14th and the closing hole of the event. That’s 18th hole proved to be the second toughest of the tournament, playing at just over half-a-stroke over par.

Stone finished the tournament 4-under par for the par 4 holes, the best in the field, and second best on the par 5s at 5-under par. She led the field in birdies with 14 (five each of the first two days and four in the final round).

“I am very happy for Latanna and her first career college individual title,” said LSU Head Coach Garrett Runion. “She played extremely well on a course the ladies said was one of the toughest, if not the toughest, they played in college golf with the wind condition. To finally get that monkey off her back and post a win was special. I know she was happy and her teammates were genuinely happy as well. Hopefully she can continue that trend as well as we continue play the next two weeks.”

The Tigers also had two other players in the top 10 in the final individual standings as Aine Donegan moved up four spots to finish in a tie for seventh place at 5-over 221 (75-73-73) for her second top 10 at LSU. The Indiana transfer had two birdies on her final day card and led the field for the tournament with 40 pars.

LSU senior Ingrid Lindblad posted a 2-over par 74 on the final day to move up two spots to a tie for 10th at 6-over 222 (77-71-74). For Lindblad, it was her 28th career top-10 finish at LSU and her fourth in four starts in the 2022-23 season.

Freshman Edit Hertzman was the other counting score for LSU on the final day with a 1-over par 73 in her third college start. Hertzman moved up 12 spots in the last round to finish T29 (+13).

“The last two days were really good if you look at it and the conditions,” said Coach Runion. “I was very pleased with the way we bounced back and continued our trend of our second and third rounds being our stronger rounds.”

LSU will now regroup and head to Melbourne, Florida and the Suntree Country Club for the Moon Golf Invitational, hosted by Louisville. That tournament begins play on Sunday.

Nexus Collegiate
Albany Golf Club
New Providence, Bahamas
Final Team Standings (Par 288-864)
1 Wake Forest 296-280-299 – 875 +11; 2 LSU 305-287-290 – 882 +18; 3 Arizona State 302-290-293 – 885 +21; 4 Auburn 288-302-300 – 890 +26; 5 South Carolina 310-292-299 – 901 +37; 6 Oklahoma State 306-293-306 – 905 +41; T7 Minnesota 309-300-310 – 919 +55; T7 Ole Miss 312-305-302 – 919 +55; 9. Duke 319-302-310 – 931 +67; 10 TCU 308-314-323 – 945 +81

Individual Top 5 (Par 72-216)
1 Latanna Stone, LSU, 72-68-70 – 210 -6; 2 Lauren Walsh, Wake Forest 75-67-73 – 215 -1; 3 Anna Foster, Auburn 72-71-74 – 217 +1; T4 Grace Summerhays, Arizona State, 77-70-71 – 218 +2; T4 Paula Schulz-Hannsen, Arizona State, 71-74-73 – 218 +2.

LSU Scores
1 Latanna Stone 72-68-70 – 210 -6
T7 Aine Donegan 75-73-73 – 221 +5
T10 Ingrid Lindblad 77-71-74 – 222 +6
T29 Edit Hertzman 81-75-73 – 229 +13
T50 Jessica Bailey 81-73-87 – 241 +25
53 Carla Tejedo 91-76-76 – 243 +27