CUBuffs.com: Lee, Buffs Win Stroke Play, Earn Top Seed In East & West Match Play Challenge (Golf)

[RSSBot]

Junior Esther Lee fired a school record 8-under par, 64 in the second round of the East & West Match Play Challenge on Sunday, earning m...

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MADISON – Junior Esther Lee fired a school record 8-under par, 64 in the second round of the East & West Match Play Challenge on Sunday, earning medalist honors and helping the Buffaloes win the stroke play portion to earn the No. 1 seed for the tournament at University Ridge Golf Course.

The meet is similar to the format of the NCAA Championships, which combines 36 holes of stroke play to determine the team seedings for two days of match play in the championship and consolation brackets. The University of Wisconsin is hosting the tournament on the par-72, 6,219 yard course.

The Buffs recorded a 292-277—569 or 11-under par scorecard as a group, which ranks as the third lowest team score in program history and their 277 in the second round matched for the lowest 18 hole score all-time. Colorado ran away from the field, winning the stroke play portion by 15 strokes as Michigan earned the No. 2 seed at 8-over par. Oregon finished at 11-over par and will be the third seed while Indiana rounds out the championship bracket as the No. 4 seed, shooting 14-over par.
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[AztecBuff]

Congrats to Esther Lee and the Buffs team for the individual and team win in the stroke play part of this tournament yesterday!

Although of course in golf the course will always be a major factor in how low a player can go, obviously winning medalist honors AND setting a CU one round record while shooting a 64 ='s a GREAT round of golf for Ms. Lee.

And, for the team, a great 1st day of competition for the year in general. In the 2nd round, all 4 scorers for the Buffs (in college golf, typically 5 players compete each round, with the top 4 scores counting for the team competition) were par or under (-8, -3, Even, Even), while the best AVERAGE score of the teams that had the 2nd best scores for the 2nd round was +1, so a dominating round for the Buffs. Of course, hard to know at the beginning of a year how their competition this tournament will end up this year, but based on last year's ratings, looks like the Buffs beat some good teams yesterday. (The Buffs ended up #30 last year in the Golfstat's ratings (http://www.golfstat.com/2014-2015/rankhth.cfm), and two teams in this tournament ended up ranked higher (UC Davis was #16, Oregon #26. Also, none of the 8 teams competing were "dogs", as only Penn State wasn't ranked in the Top 100, and they just missed last year at #104.)

Having said all the above, I just found what I believe to be live scoring (http://www.golfstatresults.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=match&tid=9453&rid=1) for the match play part of the tournament, and it looks like the Buffs are down in 3 of 5 matches against Indiana in the quarterfinals, up in only 1 and tied in 1, so will need to rally to advance. (In two of the matches the Buffs are down, it's only by 1 (3 holes left) and 2 (6 plays left) holes, so all hope isn't loss, but it's not looking great.)

 

[AztecBuff]

Congrats to the Buffs as it looks like they came back and nipped Indiana 3 matches to 2 in match play to advance to the finals against Oregon (edit- found time for the finals, they are stargin early tomorrow morning).

Buff scoring leader Esther Lee continues to impress, as she won relatively easy (5 and 4), while Buffs Alexis Keating and Natalie Vivaldi both staged good comebacks, the former winning the last two holes after being down one through 16, the later coming back from being down 1 through 15 and also sealing the victory with a win on the final (18th) hole.

 

[AztecBuff]

Just wanted to add re yesterday's results, found an article from Wisconsin's (the tournament host school) website, and it definitely looks like Esther Lee's and the Buff's team performances yesterday were GREAT , even taking into account the specific (Wisconsin's home) golf course they were playing at. Quoting from the Article- (http://www.uwbadgers.com/sports/w-golf/recaps/092015aac.html# ):

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Colorado’s Esther Lee leads the player leaderboard by two strokes, following a 36-hole score that put her in the University Ridge record book. Her 7-under 73-64=137 round is tied for the third-best 36-hole performance at Wisconsin’s home course. Lee’s second round score of 64 is the new 18-hole women's collegiate record trumping four previous marks of 65.
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Additionally, Colorado’s second round score of 277 ties Arizona State’s 1998 NCAA Championship performance for the best women's collegiate team 18-hole mark at the No. 3 campus course in the country. The Buffaloes’ 36-hole score of 569 is the second-best ever.
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[AztecBuff]

Article on the Buffs advancing to the finals of the tournament- http://www.cubuffs.com//ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=600&ATCLID=210360975

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MADISON – The University of Colorado women’s golf team rallied late to win its match on Monday, defeating Indiana 3 & 2 to advance to the championship match here in the East & West Challenge.

The Buffaloes, earned the top seed after winning the 36-hole stroke play portion a day earlier and were the only higher seeded team between both the championship and consolation brackets to win its opening match.

With sophomore Brittany Fan and junior Esther Lee already finished for the afternoon, Colorado was trailing in their other three matches, but solid play down the stretch from seniors Alexis Keating and Allie Zech, and junior Natalie Vivaldi, the Buffs fought their way back to win two out of the three and move on to Tuesday’s match play finals.

Colorado will face fellow Pac-12 Conference opponent Oregon in the championship match on the par-72, 6,219 yard University Ridge Golf Course. The No. 3 seeded Ducks defeated Michigan 4 & 1 to also advance.
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The championship match is set to begin at 8:33 MDT on Tuesday. Live scoring is available on Golfstat.com.
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[Idot Buff]

Fantastic!

 

[AztecBuff]

Article about today's finals against Oregon- http://www.cubuffs.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=600&ATCLID=210363754 . In short, looks like the Buffs lost a close 3 matches to 2 decision to the Ducks.

Still sounds like it was a good tournament overall during this fall training season for the golfers, highlighted by the record setting performances noted in earlier posts in Sunday's stroke play rounds.