Maggie Ramold | Staff Writer
The Buena Vista University (BVU) women’s golf team is gearing up for conference play and has competed in three tournaments so far this season in order to prepare.
This year’s team features two returners, senior Jasey Zander and sophomore Elizabeth Kim. Senior Courtney Van Haaften and junior Alison Wedemeyer make their college debut this season on the golf course.
The Beavers opened the season with the Sail Classic hosted by Luther College. Overall, the team showed great improvement over the weekend. Zander led the team shooting a 91 on the first day out, shaving six strokes off her score on Saturday to finish with an 85. Fellow returner Kim also improved from the first day with 94 on Saturday compared to her 98 on Friday.
“I feel that the team performed great for the first outing of the season. Our team is inexperienced when it comes to collegiate golf, but we are all willing to improve. It showed in our scores from Friday to Saturday,” Zander said.
Van Haaften and Wedemeyer also showed improvement on their college debut. Van Haaften cut three strokes off her Friday score for a 99 on Saturday, and Wedemeyer took seven shots off her score from the first day.
BVU traveled to Waverly the following weekend to compete in the Wartburg Fall Invitation hosted by Wartburg College. Zander once again led the team on the day finishing tied for 55th, taking two strokes off her score from Saturday to Sunday. Van Haaften showed a huge improvement by taking off 16 strokes from day one to post a score of 100 on day two.
“So far, this season has definitely been a learning experience for me. Even though the team is small, it’s fun to go out and compete with one another every day and work on getting better,” Van Haaften said.
Zander believes as a four year golfer for BVU she needs to lead the team as they head into the Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (IIAC) tournament in a couple of weeks.
“We are all excited for the next couple of tournaments, especially conference. All of us have been working hard in practice to improve, so I am excited to see how we take our game to the next level,” Zander said.
The team will travel to Cedar Falls this weekend Sept. 26 and 27 to compete in the first round of their conference tournament. The second weekend of conference play takes place in Dubuque on Oct. 3 and 4.
