VIDEO: Suzanne Strudwick Interview
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn – After completing a fall schedule that included a victory at the King Intercollegiate in September, the Carson-Newman women's golf team is preparing for a spring that will see them compete in five more tournaments.
The docket for Coach Suzanne Strudwick's team begins with the Kiawah Invitational the first week in February and concludes in early April with the SAC Championship.
"[We're playing on] a variety of courses," Strudwick said, "but there's also a really good build up towards conference. We start out on familiar ground at Kiawah, although they're going through a whole bunch of renovations, so the course is different. We're playing Oak Hill as opposed to Turtle Hill, where we've played before, but the area is familiar and the course will be somewhat familiar."
This year will mark the fourth straight time C-N has played in the Kiawah Invitational, which will be held from Feb. 4th -5th at Oak Point Country Club in Johns Island, S.C. The Eagles will be trying to improve upon an eighth place finish in 2016. Elizabeth England (Oakland, Tenn.) finished with her squad's best score, tying for 11th at +13.
Next up for Coach Strudwick's student-athletes is the Converse Spring Invite at the Carolina Country Club in Spartanburg, S.C. This will be the team's first chance to compete in this event and they will be in a field that includes conference rival Anderson (S.C.), the tournament's defending champions.
"The team has been [to Converse] before," Strudwick said, "not this team, but we've been there before. It's a fairly local event for us. I'm look at mostly conference, regional teams that we can play very well [against] and move up in the rankings."
For their third competition of the spring, the Eagles will make the short journey to the Sevierville Golf Club Highlands in Sevierville, Tenn. for the Bobby Nichols Intercollegiate, which will be held from March 19th- 21st and hosted by Tennessee Tech In the spring of 2016, the squad earned an eighth place finish at this event and Taylor Hayes (Lake Ozark, Mo.) topped the C-N leaderboard, as she tied for 17th.
The Sunoco Campbell Oil Classic, hosted by UNC-Pembroke at the River Landing Golf Club in Wallace, N.C., will be C-N's final tune up prior to the conference championship. Carson-Newman will be playing in this tournament for the first time and it is currently set for March 27th-28th.
For the SAC Championships, C-N will make the trip to Link Hills Country Club in Greeneville, Tenn. for three days of golf from April 9th- 11th. Just two seasons ago, Coach Strudwick saw her team take home the top prize, finishing seven strokes ahead of the field to pick up their third conference title. In 2016, the Eagles posted a second place showing, just four strokes behind Queens (N.C.). Hayes put up her team's best finish, as she placed fourth and England earned a tie for ninth.
"I believe with the build-up in the schedule," Strudwick said, "there's enough gaps for the girls to get rested if we have any injury issues. We'll be able to deal with those and have enough time [to heal], but we're also building the momentum. Something I've realized, the girls don't perform as well when we play back-to-back-to-back. I think I've spaced the schedule out to where it's a great momentum builder, we can see what we've got, but there's enough there that the girls won't feel overwhelmed."
To follow the Carson-Newman women's golf team all season long, visit cneagles.com and follow Carson-Newman athletics on Twitter at @CNathletics.
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