Michigan State University Athletics
Women's Golf Heads To 2005 Big Ten Championship
4/21/2005 12:00:00 AM | Women's Golf
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April 21, 2005
EAST LANSING, Mich. - Michigan State women's golf hits the road this weekend (April 22-24) as they head to the campus of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor to battle at the 2005 Big Ten Championships. The tournament, which will be played at the University of Michigan Golf Course, features 72 holes of competition, with 36 played on Friday (April 22), 18 on Saturday (April 23) and the final 18 holes on Sunday (April 24).
Coming off of their first tournament title of the season, the Spartans enter the Big Ten Championships seeded fourth in the 11-team field. Teams scheduled to compete in this year's championships include: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue and Wisconsin.
In their most recent outing of the year, the 2005 Lady Buckeye Invitational hosted by Big-Ten rival Ohio State, MSU took home its first team title of the season in powerful fashion. The Spartans held a nine-stroke lead over the rest of the 15-team field, on way to placing their starting five golfers within the top-20 individuals.
Sophomore Rachel Meikle (Fort Wayne, Ind.) paced the way for the Green and White, as she continued her late-season success. Meikle finished in second place at the Lady Buckeye Invitational (April 16-17), the best showing of her young career. Alongside her runner-up outing in Columbus, Meikle had a solid outing at the Liz Murphey Invitational one week prior, finishing tied for 14th. All told in the final two events of the year, Meikle has broken her career best in placing, as well as finishing in the top-20 individual standings.
Freshman Sara Brown (Tucson, Ariz.) will be making her first-ever post-season appearance for MSU in this weekend's championship. Brown excelled at last weekend's Lady Buckeye, finishing 10th overall. Her best outing of the season came at the Lady Paladin Invitational (Oct. 22-24), where she broke into the top-10 for the first time in her career, finishing tied for ninth.
Sophomore Mandi McConnell (Grand Blanc, Mich.) also will be making the trip to Ann Arbor. McConnell has had a breakout year in her second season with the Green and White, showing herself to be a strong and consistent force on the golf course. McConnell's finest outing of the year came at the Lady Northern Invitational where she finished tied for 10th. The University of Michigan Golf Course played host to that event earlier this season.
Fellow sophomore Heather Rose (Chillicothe, Ohio) will be making her second-career appearance at the Big Ten Championships. Rose is one of the veterans on the squad in only her second season of collegiate golf, making appearances in last season's NCAA post-season run, which could only be beneficial for the Spartans in this year's battle. Rose's best showing of the year came at the Lady Northern Invitational (Sept. 11-12), where she finished tied for 22nd.
Junior Dayna Burleigh (Horsham, Pa.) enters this season's Big Ten Championships with the most collegiate golfing experience on the team. She has appeared in 31 events in her three seasons at Michigan State, including four post-season tournaments. Burleigh's best showing of the year came at last weekend's Lady Buckeye Invitational, where she tied for 13th.
Rounding out the roster for the Green and White is redshirt freshman Kristen Polanski (Livonia, Mich.). Polanski has appeared in six events with her best outing of the season at the Mary Fossum Invitational, where she finished in a tie for sixth place. It was the first top-10 finish of her young career.
Admission is free to the general public for the championships. Parking information can be found by logging onto www.mgoblue.com. The tournament will also feature live-scoring which can be found on the Spartans' athletic website, www.msuspartans.com.
