McCauley Follows 67 with 68, Earns Spot in NCAA Championships

College

WESTFIELD, Ind. -- The odds are heavily against a player getting to the NCAA Championships as an individual -- basically, they're 25 to 1 -- but Bella McCauley beat the odds this week. On Wednesday, the University of Minnesota freshman shot a 4-under-par 68 at The Club at Chatham Hills. That gave her a 54-hole total of 209 (7 under) and sole possession of sixth place in the Westfield NCAA Regional. And with that, she earned the one spot that was available at Westfield to an individual for this year's NCAA Championships, which will be played at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz., May 19-24.

There were six NCAA Regional tournaments being played during the last three days. Five teams (five players per team) advanced from each of those regionals, but only one individual on a non-advancing team made it out of each regional. In other words, 25 players will be advancing from each regional -- 150 players in all -- but only six individuals will be going on to Scottsdale.

Mississippi State dominated the team competition at Chatham Hills, going wire to wire and finishing first despite a less-than-stellar effort in the final round. The Bulldogs' team score of 290 (four scores out of five count toward the total) was the 10th best on Wednesday in a field of 12 teams, but the they still managed to win the team title by two strokes over Oregon State, 845 to 847. Vanderbilt ended up third, just three behind Mississippi State at 848. Virginia got the fourth spot with an aggregate of 849, and Tulsa claimed the fifth -- and last -- team reservation for the NCAAs with an 855.

Iowa State missed qualifying for Scottsdale by five, with a sixth-place finish at 860. Xavier, which started the day tied for sixth with Iowa State, three shots out of the top five, slipped back into a tie for seventh, along with Tennessee at 863. 

Fortunately for McCauley, the top five individual finishers were all on one of those top five teams. Virginia sophomore Amanda Sambach, an honorable mention All-American last year and the winner of the ACC individual title this spring, made five birdies in her last 12 holes on Wednesday, and that enabled her to catch Mississippi State sophomore Julia Lopez Ramirez. They tied for medalist honors with 54-hole totals of 203 (minus 13).

Sambach shot 68. Ramirez closed with a 70. So did her Bulldog teammate Hannah Levi, a senior who finished one stroke behind the co-medalists at 204. Levi birdied the 485-yard, par-5 13th hole, and that put her two ahead of Sambach and in a tie for first with Ramirez. She was still tied for the lead with one hole to go, but she bogeyed the 354-yard, par-4 18th.

Vanderbilt's Celina Sattelkau was also in the race for first, after playing the front nine in 3-under 33. But she parred the next four holes and bogeyed two of the last five for a 71, which dropped her back into fourth at 206. Grace Kilcrease made a big move on the front nine, with five birdies in the first six holes, and another at the ninth. The Tulsa freshman was 8 under for the day after she birdied the par-4 12th and par-5 13th. But she bogeyed the 14th and 18th, and that kept her from tying Sattelkau for fourth. She still posted the second-lowest score of the day, a 66, moved up eight places from where she started the round, and ended up in sole possession of fifth place with a 208.

Then came McCauley, alone in sixth at 209. The former Minnesota state high school champion from Inver Grove Heights was tied for 41st after a first-round 74, but she came back with a 67 on Tuesday. On Wednesday, she went right to work, birdying the par-4 first hole (357 yards). Three pars followed, but she birdied the par-5 fifth (510), and concluded the front nine with birdies at the par-3 eighth and the par-4 ninth. She added a third birdie in a row at the 365-yard, par-4 10th, which got her to 5 under for the day.

As it turned out, that pretty much secured her place in the field at the NCAA Championships, as long as she could avoid disaster on the way to the clubhouse, which she did. McCauley had one minor hiccup on the back nine, a bogey at the 375-yard, par-4 16th. Nevertheless, the resulting 68 and 209 aggregate kept her one ahead of the two players who tied for seventh -- Chayse Gomez and Madde Sund -- and they both played for an advancing team: Oregon State. 

McCauley, who tied for second in the Big Ten Championships, wound up with a two-stroke cushion between her and the next-highest finishers from non-advancing teams. Actually, there were three of them in a four-way tie for ninth at 211 -- Hsin-Yu Lu of 10th-place Oregon, along with Tennessee's Vanessa Gilly and Xavier's Emma McMyler. Tennessee and Xavier tied for seventh.

Each of the regional tournaments had 12 teams and six players competing as individuals only. The next-highest finisher among those individuals at Westfield was Colorado State's Sofia Torres, who shot 70 for the second day in a row on Wednesday and tied for 21st at 214. Lauren Beaudreau of Notre Dame ended up tied for 27th at 217, after closing with a 71, and the No. 4 finisher among the individual onlys was McCauley's Gopher teammate Mariana Mesones. Mesones, who is also a freshman, shot 76 on Wednesday and posted a 221. That put her in a tie for 37th.

There will be at least one other Minnesotan, or former Minnesotan, at this year's NCAA Championships. South Carolina, the No. 4 team in the Golfstat Rankings, is coached by Kalen Anderson, who played on four state championship teams at Edina High School in the 1990s -- and had four top-4 finishes in the state tournament as an individual. (She was also a two-time State Girls Junior champion.) Anderson was on two NCAA championship teams at Duke as a player, was an All-American, and then was an assistant coach for another of Duke's NCAA championship teams.  

South Carolina finished second in the Athens Regional this week, with an overall score of 853. That put the Gamecocks two behind the regional champion, Georgia -- and 25 strokes ahead of third-place San Jose State. This is the 11th time in Anderson's 16 seasons as the South Carolina head coach that her team has qualified for the NCAAs. The Gamecocks have two top-5 finishes in those 11 appearances, and the program has produced 39 All-Americans under Anderson, who has been named the SEC Coach of the Year three times.      


NCAA Westfield Regional

At The Club at Chatham Hills

Par 72, 6,300 yards

Westfield, Ind. 

Final results (the top five teams qualify for the NCAA Championships, May 19-24 at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.) 

1. Mississippi State               280-275-290--845

2. Oregon State                    286-277-284--847

3. Vanderbilt                         287-282-279--848

4. Virginia                             287-284-278--849

5. Tulsa                                279-292-284--855

Did not advance

6. Iowa State                       286-288-286--860

T7. Xavier                           289-285-289--863

T7.. Tennessee                   288-294-281--863

9. Michigan                         283-294-289--866

10. Oregon                         294-291-288--873

11. Morehead State.           296-302-293--891

12. Lipscomb                     299-301-296--896

Individuals (the top individual not on an advancing team qualifies for the NCAA Championships)                     

T1. Amanda Sambach, Virginia           69-66-68--203 (-13)

T1. Julia Lopez Ramirez, Miss. State  67-66-70--203

3. Hannah Levi, Mississippi State       68-66-70--204

5. Celina Sattekau, Vanderbilt            69-66-71--206

6. Grace Kilcrease, Tulsa.                  69-73-66--208

7. Bella McCauley, Minnesota         74-67-68--209 (qualifies for NCAA)

T7. Chayse Gomez, Oregon State.     71-68-71--210

T7. Madde Sund, Oregon State.         68--71-71--210

T9. Tillie Claggett, Vanderbilt.             73-73-65--211 

T9. Emma McMyler, Xavier                 71-70-70--211

T9. Vanessa Gilly, Tennessee              71-73-67--211

T9. Hsin-Yu Lu, Oregon                       73-72-66--211

T37. Mariana Mesones, Minnesota   74-71-76--221