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No. 3 Women's Golf Opens Play In Southeastern Conference Championships

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No. 3 Women's Golf Opens Play In Southeastern Conference Championships

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama – The LSU women’s golf team, ranked No. 3 in both the Mizuno WGCA Coaches Poll and the Golfstat performance rankings, looks to try to capture the league title for a second straight year when the 2023 Southeastern Conference women’s golf championships get underway here Wednesday at the Greystone Golf and Country Club’s Legacy Course.

The 14 league teams will play 54 holes of stroke play through Friday with the top eight teams advancing on to match play beginning on Saturday morning. The two teams remaining will meet in a nationally-televised golf match on Sunday to decide the title.

A year ago, LSU finished second in the 54-hole qualifying tournament and then scored match play wins over Vanderbilt, Alabama and Florida to capture the team’s first league championship since 1992. In addition, Ingrid Lindblad, made a 38-foot eagle putt on the par 5 risk-reward 18th hole to win the individual championship for the Tigers.

Three members of that championship team will tee it up on Wednesday when the tournament begins – seniors Lindblad and Latanna Stone and junior Carla Tejedo.

Lindblad has two wins this season, to give her a school record 11 victories in her LSU career, while Stone recorded her first collegiate victory this season and is coming off an eighth-place finish in the prestigious Augusta National Women’s Amateur.

Tejedo was rock solid for the Tigers in last year’s match play portion of the event and, like Lindblad, was also a participant in the Augusta National Women’s Amateur. The Spaniard finished second for the second consecutive year in the Jackson T. Stephens Cup at historic Seminole Golf Club.

This year’s team lineup will also feature sophomore Aine Donegan from Ireland and Swedish freshman Edit Hertzman. Donegan transferred to LSU from Indiana and has been a strong factor for LSU all season and Hertzman in her first year finished second in the prestigious Darius Rucker Intercollegiate.

In the latest Mizuno WGCA Coaches Poll, eight different Southeastern Conference teams are in the top 25 entering the championships – No. 3 LSU, followed by No. 4 South Carolina and No. 5 Mississippi State. Auburn is the fourth team in the top 10 at No. 10. Texas A&M is No. 11, Ole Miss is No. 15, Vanderbilt is 19 and Florida is 20.

In the individual Golfstat performance rankings, 16 golfers from the SEC are ranked in the top 50 nationally, led by Jenny Bae of Georgia at No. 3, Lindblad from LSU at No. 4, Julia Lopez Ramirez of Mississippi State at No. 5 and Hannah Darling at South Carolina at No. 6.

Donegan is No. 36 entering the championships and Stone is at No. 46.

This marks the 10th time for the Southeastern Conference Championship to be contested at the Greystone Golf and Country Club. The SEC has conducted its annual championship at Greystone since 2013.

The Legacy Course is carved naturally from a visually dramatic landscape of placid lakes, meandering streams and the undulation of Alabama’s Appalachian foothills, The Legacy requires unwavering physical and mental acumen. Designed by world-famous architect, Rees Jones, each hole is an inviting yet demanding contest, allowing the player to visualize the shot. The zoysia fairways and bent grass greens found at Legacy provide members with surfaces that are both challenging and rewarding.

“We had a good practice round (Tuesday), said fifth-year LSU head coach Garrett Runion. “The biggest challenge is the new greens and a couple new bunkers, shaped up a little bit different. They are deeper and so the biggest thing is getting used to the firm greens and them releasing out. We kind of have to remind our three older players – Ingrid, Latanna, Carla – who have been around this place a bunch, that what they see now is different. It’s not going to do what it used to do because it’s different while Aine and Edit haven’t seen it’s before so it’s all new and they don’t need to do how it played in the past.

“I think that’s the biggest part is getting used to the firm greens. We have a longer hitting team. We played a tough schedule with long courses we should be good with all that.”

LSU has four team wins on the season, two in the fall and Moon Golf Invitational and the Rucker in the spring.

Since the start of the stroke/match play format of the event, no team has captured the title more than once and it is back to the 2011 and 2012 tournament that any team has won the tournament two straight years in the stroke play only format.

LSU will be in the opening wave off the first tee at 8 a.m. CT with South Carolina and Missouri as the opening round pairings are based on the current national performance rankings. The forecast is for plenty of sunshine, temperatures that will reach the upper 70s and winds from 5-10 miles per hour.

Live scoring for the event can be found on Golfstat.com and updates throughout the round can be found on LSU women’s golf twitter @LSUwomensgolf.