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May 25, 2007
FINAL RESULTS in PDF Format
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Junior Paola Moreno posted Troy's fourth best NCAA individual finish in school history, freshman Belen Mozo climbed into the top 20 and the No. 4 USC women's golf team posted their third top 4 finish in the last five years on the final day of the 2007 NCAA Women's Golf Championships on Friday (May 25) at the LPGA International Legends Course in Daytona Beach, Fla.
USC, the 2003 NCAA title winner in its 10th consecutive NCAA Championships final under 11th-year head coach Andrea Gaston, posted a combined 291 fourth round, tied for the third best round in the 24-team, four-day event. The strong final round helped the Trojans squeeze into fourth place with a 72-hole, 44-over 1196 (295-306-304-291). USC was second last year.
Duke won its third straight team title at 18-over, 1170. Purdue was second (1185), UCLA was third (1186), USC was fourth (1196) with Stanford fifth (1197). Rounding out the top 10 was Vanderbilt (1200), Pepperdine (1202), Georgia (1205), Auburn (1213) and Louisville (1214).
USC was in fifth for much of the final round before passing Stanford during the last few holes. USC's fourth-place finish is its seventh top 5 result in school history.
"I feel like we have some momentum with the program with these type of finishes," Gaston said. "I was happy with second last year and to come back as we did after a bad second round this year, I'm proud of the girls.
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"I knew we had to get off to a great start today, which we did. We struggled those middle two days. To turn the momentum around, we needed a strong start and it was great to get it."
Moreno's fired a final-round 1-under 71 to finish 2-under overall with a 286 (73-72-70-71), tied for second with Purdue's Christel Boeljon. Arkansas' Stacy Lewis won the individual title, erasing a six-stroke deficit behind third-round leader Boeljon. Lewis won the event thanks in large part to a fourth-round 66, winning with a 282.
"Paola has obviously been steady the whole year," Gaston said. "She enjoyed this course because she was used to the conditions and the type of grass. So she was very comfortable. She was going to have to really go deep to have a chance at first and no one anticipated the round Lewis had.
"She didn't get off to her best start, but the back-to-back birdies on 2 and 3 changed her momentum to finish strong. I was very prod of her. After a long chase, we finally tied Stanford. We needed a birdie and Paola was sure of herself that she could get one and she did."
The only Trojans to finish better than Moreno in team history were NCAA individual title winners Jennifer Rosales (1998), Mikaela Parmlid (2003) and Dewi Claire Schreefel (2006). In fact, Moreno's 286 was the same score Schreefel had last year and was 11 better than Parmlid's 2003 total. Rosales won her title with a 279, the only NCAA Championship total better than Moreno's and Scheefel's.
Moreno, ranked No. 10 in the country by Golfweek.com, mirrored her steady play all tournament during her final round. Starting on the 10th hole with the rest of the team, she posted a 1-over front 9 with only a bogey on 17. After a bogey on the 1st hole, she birdied 2 and 3 to get even and then birdied the 8th hole to go under par for the round.
"I was struggling on the front 9," Moreno said, "but came back in the second half and made two straight birdies on 2 and 3 and then kept making pars and birdied the par 5 (8th hole). It was a good comeback. I wasn't playing well, but came back.
"It's hard to ignore (the leaderboard). I asked coach `How are we doing?' and she told me we were one back of Stanford in fifth and that I was in third. We wanted to catch Stanford. I then got the birdie on 8 (the 17th hole of the round) and finished strong knowing what we needed to do. I was happy for the team and myself.
"We're very happy," Moreno continued. "Dewi and Belen played really well and Veronica did well, just struggled at the end. It was good to have a consistent round. It's hard to coordinate the scores and we did it today when we needed to."
Moreno's tie for second was her third top 2 finish in USC's last five outings and sixth in the top 10 this season.
Mozo posted a final-round 2-under 70, tying Moreno's third round for best on the team during the NCAA Championships and good for her second best round of the season. She finished tied for 17th with an 11-over 299 (75-80-74-70).
She birdied the 13th and 14th holes en route to a 1-under front 9 and then birdied the 2nd and 3rd holes for a 1-under back 9. Her tie for 17th marked her sixth top 20 finish in seven starts after transferring to USC for the spring semester in January.
Junior Dewi Claire Schreefel, the defending NCAA individual champion, carded her best round of the tournament with a final round par 72. She tied for 50th overall with an 18-over 306 (76-78-80-72). She was 1-under on the front 9 with birdies on 11, 12 and 18 and was 1-over on the back 9 with another birdie on 3. She was 2-under until a pair of bogeys on the final two holes.
Seniors Veronica Felibert (71-81-82-78) and Catalina Marin (77-76-80-79) finished tied for 76th with 24-over 312s. They each had one birdie during their final round as Trojans.
