May 24, 2006
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Behind a 1-under 71 performance from sophomore Abigale Schepperle in round two, the Auburn women's golf team moved up two spots to seventh at the NCAA Championship, held at the par 72, 6,203-yard Scarlet Course at The Ohio State University Golf Club.
"It was a better day for us," Auburn head coach Kim Evans said. "Actually, it wasn't as complete of a day for us as yesterday, but our finish was much better. There were very tough conditions in the afternoon."
Auburn shot a 10-over 298 for the day to combine for a two-day total of 301-298--599 at 23-over. Schepperle, who is tied for fifth individually (74-71--145), was the only player under par for Auburn but the Tigers' other sophomore on the team, Margaret Shirley, was just 1-over for the day (77-73--150) and sits in a tie for 29th overall.
Arizona State leads the team competition at 10-over (292-294--586) despite not winning either of the first two rounds. They are followed by second place Duke at 13-over (297-292--589), third place Southern California at 15-over (291-300--591), fourth place Tennessee at 17-over (303-290--593) and Purdue and Pepperdine sit in a tie for fifth after carding identical scores of 20-over (301-295--596). Auburn holds seventh place at 23-over by one stroke as Florida fired a two-day score of 24-over (293-307--600).
Including Schepperle in a tie for fifth and Shirley, who is tied for 29th, Auburn individuals include Maria Martinez, who is tied for 22nd at 5-over (73-76--149), Jessica Lovell tied for 97th at 14-over (80-78--158) and Nicole Hage is tied for 106th at 15-over (77-82--159).
"A lot of times you can try to play too hard and I think that is what we saw out there with Nicole (Hage) and Maria (Martinez) and with this course you can't do that," Evans said. "You have to hold yourself back and play smart on your hole locations. They are trying though and we definitely don't feel that we are out of it, we just have to take care of tomorrow. I am please we have moved up and we just need to keep trying to do that every day."
The four-day tournament will continue through Friday with live scoring on www.golfstat.com and daily recaps on the Tigers at www.auburntigers.com. Auburn will tee off at 12:20 p.m. CT along with SEC foes Florida and LSU.