Women’s golf team finishes fourth at Bradley Invitiational
The rain in Peoria, Illinois didn’t stop the women’s golf team from having a successful weekend.
The team placed fourth out of 11 teams at the Bradley Invitational in Peoria, held Saturday and Sunday at the WeaverRidge Golf Club.
USD’s senior Brenna Lervick finished in a tie for second place, shooting one-under par with 71 in the first round, 72 in the second and 73 in the third.
Junior Abby Dufrane tied for 11th. Dufrane was one of three golfers at the tournament to record an eagle.
The women played on a wet field, as Peoria accumulated some three inches of rain over four days prior.
Dufrane said she thinks the rain helped.
“A lot of us were really nervous about how we were going to play, and it’s already kind of a longer course on its own,” Dufrane said. “So, we’re getting no roll on the course, on the fairway. It made it more difficult, but I think it also kind of made me more precise. I think it made me focus more on the target I wanted to hit not, ‘Okay, I will have it roll out to here,’ because we didn’t get any roll. So I think that really helped a lot with the process of it.”
After the first day, USD was seventh, and then moved up to fourth on Sunday. Dufrane said the move boosted the confidence of the team.
“We’re all kind of getting back in the groove of things, kind of getting our confidence back up,” she said. “And I think this weekend helped a lot
of us.”
John Vining, assistant coach of the women’s golf team, said the team is headed in the
right direction.
“We keep having different ladies step up,” Vining said. “And that’s the goal, is to play the best at the
right time.”
Bradley took the team title at 19-over par with 883 strokes and was also the only team to shoot under 290 for a round.
Drake was the runner up with 909 strokes, followed by Missouri-St. Louis. USD came in third at 50-over par. USD defeated their Summit League opponent Western Illinois by four strokes.
“I would just like to applaud our team on finally playing like we should,” Lervick said. “I think we all worked for it and practiced hard since our last tournaments. Overall, I think, going forward, there’s one last opportunity to make a few adjustments and keep playing before that big conference tournament.”
The Coyotes will be in Kansas on Sunday to play in the UMKC Kansas City Shoot Out.
