The Michigan women’s golf team hopes that falling short
will be greater motivation than success.
With a chance to preview the Big Ten competition this weekend at
the Lady Boilermaker Invitational, the Wolverines hoped for a
top-four finish, but fell short, as they ended the weekend sixth
out of 12 teams.
Michigan coach Kathy Teichert was pleased by the 303 and 313
team totals on day one, but she was disappointed in
Michigan’s final round total of 329.
“We didn’t play very well yesterday, but Saturday we
played well,” Teichert said.
Junior Laura Olin finished her first round one under par, with a
71. After scoring an 80 in the next round, Olin finished the first
day tied for eighth with freshman teammate Brianna Broderick, who
shot a 75 and 76. With two 84s in the final round, both girls
totaled 235 for the tournament.
Following the duo’s lead, Michigan finished in fifth place
after two rounds, just two strokes out of fourth.
Teichert believed that they positioned themselves well after the
first day of play, but fell short in yesterday’s
performance.
“This weekend I thought we probably needed to finish top
four,” Teichert said. “I think, realistically,
we’re very capable of doing that. We’re very close to
accomplishing that, but we’re a couple swings off, a couple
breaks going our way. But golf’s not always a game about
breaks. It’s a lot about your confidence and whether your
swing is going to hold up in extreme pressures and
conditions.”
Unfortunately Michigan’s swings did not hold up in what
Teichert described as 40-to-50 mile-per-hour winds on Sunday.
“We played with Northwestern today, and they played very
well today,” Teichert said. “We just didn’t keep
up.”
The lowest score among the first six teams on Sunday was a 75,
but only sophomore Amy Schmucker could even break the 80-stroke
barrier (79), giving her a tournament total of 235 strokes.
Though Teichert was disappointed in yesterday’s
performance, she is already thinking about the future. She plans to
use this week to rebuild the team’s confidence. She saw this
weekend that Big Ten teams are beatable, but the Wolverines will
have to play their game confidently and bring together four solid
rounds.
“We’ll be looking forward to going back and getting
in some good practices,” Teichert said. “It’s
just a matter of hitting balls and putting, so that they can regain
a lot of their confidence going into next week. I think we have so
much talent on our team that when they can put it all together and
they feel like they can do it and they know they can do it and they
have the confidence to do it, nothing’s going to stop
them.”