After a solid fifth place finish in last week's season opening Ptarmigan Ram Fall Classic, USF will compete at Almaden Golf and Country Club for the Juli Inkster Spartan Invitational from Sept. 19-20.
Along with USF and host San Jose State, the field will include BYU, UC Irvine, Cal Poly, Colorado, Colorado State, Gonzaga, Long Beach State, Nevada and Santa Clara. The 11-team field will play 36 holes on Monday, as part of a shotgun format. Tuesday will hold 18 holes- with both days teeing off at 9 a.m. The Dons will be paired with fellow West Coast Conference member BYU, and last week's Ptarmigan Ram Fall Classic host, Colorado State.
USF will employ the same lineup, but in different order this time around. Head coach Sarah Glynn will send out (in this order) Vanessa Ha, Mabel Wong, Ayaka Suzuki, Alison Lillie and Samantha Gong.
"We are certainly looking to build from last week to this week's Spartan invitational," said Glynn. "We will be seeing many of the same teams and so it's our chance to take what we have learned and pick up some strokes on our competition."
Located in San Jose, Calif., the Almaden Golf and Country Club will be configured to play at 6,190 yards and a par of 72. In 2015, the Spartans would win their own event with a three round total of 897. Megan Osland of SJSU and Martina Edberg of Cal State Fullerton were co-medalists as both scored a total of 219.
After an opening round 302 in last week's Ptarmigan Classic, the Dons carded rounds of 294 and 296 to finish at 892 (+28). SJSU would go on and win with a 13 stroke lead, as the Spartans finished with a total of 871 (+7).
"Last week was a solid start for us," explained Glynn. "We struggled a little with our start but the team fought back and we climbed the leader board in rounds 2 and 3. As a team we all agreed that we have lots of room for improvement and yet we still came away with a solid finish. The team energy was great and the support and love for one another was fun to watch. Jack and I saw a new side to this program and it is encouraging to see this early on in the season."
Following the Juli Inkster Spartan Invitational, USF will have a week off before traveling to Denver, Colo. for the Ron Moore Intercollegiate (Oct. 7-9) at Highlands Ranch Golf Club.
