Sports
Women’s golf begins its inaugural season
By Kaitlin McCabe ’16
September 27, 2012
With the formation of a new team comes a combination of high expectations and new opportunities. This season, Hamilton College added a women’s golf team to the varsity athletics program, making it the 29th sport in total.
On Saturday, Sept. 22 and Sunday, Sept. 23, the Hamilton women’s golf team had the opportunity to play at “the Orchards”, the 2004 LPGA US OPEN golf course at Mount Holyoke College.
The tournament proved to be a challenge for the Hamilton teammates. However, after a shaky start on Saturday, the women improved their scores considerably on Sunday.
“We came into the second day in last place by 10 strokes, but managed to shave 28 strokes off our team score for 13th place,” said Anne Govern ’15. “I think that says a lot about the mentality of our team, that we won’t give up and that we can come back after a difficult day on a tough course and have every single player shoot a better round than the day before.”
By the end of the tournament, the Hamilton women’s golf team had a combined score of 782. Govern finished with scores of 90 and 87 and a total score of 177, and Gillian Dudeck ’13 received scores of 95 and 88, finishing with a total score of 183.
Dudeck said, “We are continuously looking to improve our game. As a team, we are enjoying both the golf and the team camaraderie while representing Hamilton College.”
Liz Morris ’16 played with scores of 133 and 116 to finish with a total of 203. Additionally, Jillian Hallak ’13 and Katie Steates ’15 competed with scores of 116 and 103 and 133 and 116, allowing them to finish with respective totals of 219 and 249. Overall, the team considers the Mount Holyoke tournament to be a learning experience.
Govern commented, “The tournament was good experience for a new team, and we hope to come out even stronger because of it in our next tournaments.”
On Saturday, Sept. 29 and Sunday, Sept. 30, Hamilton’s women’s golf team will have an opportunity to demonstrate their current abilities and to improve on their skill set at the Middlebury College Invitational.