May 11, 2007

St. George, Utah - The University of Memphis women's golf team remained in 18th place after turning in a 28-over 312 in Friday's second round of the NCAA West Regional hosted by BYU at Entrada at Snow Canyon Country Club.

Memphis showed an eight-stroke improvement from the first to the second rounds despite only a 12-hour turnaround from the time they finished Thursday's competition and the time they hit the links Friday morning.

"I think we did well considering how quick we had to get going this morning after a late night Thursday," said Head Coach Jenny Bruun. "Right now we can get a little recovery time and will get rested up for the final round."

Stacey Tate again led the Lady Tigers' effort, improving by one stroke and firing a two-over 73 which placed her in a four-way tie for 14th place. She teed off on the back side and was even through her first nine holes. She managed two birdies on the front side, but matched that with four bogeys for a two-over 37. She enters Saturday's final round with a two-round score of 147.

"Stacey continued to play very solid today," said Bruun. "She dominated the tough side, but I think the heat played a bit of a factor later in the round."

Bruun said that the temperature was expected to hit a high of 98 degrees and was nearing 95 degrees when her squad wrapped up play Friday afternoon. In addition, Meghan Mahoney, who was second for Memphis in the first round, withdrew from Friday's round with a back injury.

Rachel Larson and Dawn-Marie Conaty showed improvement in today's round as both finished at eight-over 79. Conaty tallied two birdies, both of which were on the front side, and Larson carded one birdie. After two rounds, Conaty is in a tie for 75th (82-79-161) and Larson is tied for 93rd (87-79-166). Kathryn O'Rourke posted a 10-over 81 for the round and holds a two-round total of 165,

Oklahoma State moved up the leaderboard and is currently in first place with a two-round total of 581 after turning in a 290 today. OSU also has two players in the top three as Pernilla Lindberg leads the field (68-68-136) and Amanda Johnson (70-74-144) is tied for third with Arizona State's Juliana Murcia (73-71-144). Pepperdine's Misun Cho fired a one-under 70 and was one of just three golfers to finish under par for the day. She currently is in second with a two-round total of 141.

Stanford is in second with a two-round total of 587, followed by Arizona State's 590 mark. UC Irvine and Pepperdine round out the top five with two-day scores of 597 and 600, respectively.

The tournament concludes on Saturday, and the Lady Tigers will tee off at 12:30 p.m. MT. The top eight teams and top two individuals from each of the three regionals will advance to the NCAA championship finals held May 22-25 at the LPGA Legends Course in Daytona Beach, Fla.

Full results are available at golfstat.com.