Ohio is competing in its second Florida tournament this week.
The Bobcats have remained focused on their competition during this week in Florida. The team played a tournament this past Monday and Tuesday in Lakewood, Florida, and will compete at the three-day Florida Gulf Coast Eagle Invitational in Estero, Florida, starting Friday.
Freshman Lily Pendy, sophomore Hayley Hrynewich, juniors Angela Codian and Lauren McKinzie and senior Julie Lechner will represent Ohio, as well as sophomore Jessica McRae who will play as an individual.
The 14-team field will consist of: Arkansas State, Daytona State, Drake, Elon, Florida Atlantic, Florida Gulf Coast, Northern Kentucky, Southern Illinois, USC Upstate, Utah Valley, Xavier, Ohio and Mid American Conference rivals Akron and Toledo.
This set of opposition is in part why the team stayed in Florida for the week, according to Coach Kelly Ovington.
“It’s a pretty strong field as far as competition for the girls and it just helped out as far as travel schedules for us staying down here,” Ovington said. “I think there’s two other teams from the north (Akron and Toledo) who did the same thing.”
The women have worked on eliminating pressure putts coming into this tournament and look to continue their good decision-making on the golf course.
“Chipping, pitching and putting basically from about 70 yards in has always been a little bit of a struggle for us,” Ovington said. “That’s been our focus coming into this tournament.”
Ohio got a sneak peak of Stoneybrook golf course Thursday as the team played it ahead of the upcoming tournament. The championship course comes in at 7,353 yards, which is one of the longest in the state.
“It’s a very nice course,” Ovington said. “The back nine is gonna be a little challenging, it has a series of about four holes that you really have to pay attention to and stay awake because they’re pretty tricky, you don’t really even need your driver on those holes, you just need a little bit of placement and patience.”
@Matt_Fout
