May 6, 2009
TEMPE, Ariz. - No. 13-seeded Texas A&M will be looking for its fifth NCAA finals berth in the last six years when the Aggies begin play in the NCAA Women's Golf West Regional on Thursday at Arizona State's Karsten Golf Course.
The top eight teams and two individuals from each of the three regionals will advance to the championship finals May 19-22 at the Caves Valley Golf Club in Owings Mills, Md. The East regional will be in Gainesville, Fla., and the Central regional will be in Columbus, Ohio.
The 54-hole event continues through Saturday. Live scoring is available at www.golfstat.com.
The Aggies are making their ninth straight regional appearance and their 14th in the last 15 seasons. A&M placed fifth at last year's Central Regional in Austin, advancing to the NCAA finals for the ninth time in school history. The Aggies were sixth at nationals, the program's best finish since 1982.
Joining A&M in the West regional in order of seeding will be top-ranked Arizona State (1), No. 3 Southern California (2), No. 10 LSU (3), No. 13 Pepperdine (4), No. 15 Arkansas (5), No. 18 San Jose State (6), No. 20 Arizona (7), No. 23 California (8), UC Irvine (9), San Francisco (10), UNLV (11), TCU (12), Oregon (14), Long Beach State (15), Colorado (16), Texas (17), Baylor (18), Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (19), Northern Arizona (20) and Oral Roberts (21).
Representing A&M will be senior Lauren Johnson, junior Ashley Freeman and sophomores Stephanie Smith. Freeman and Zwartynski were named to the All-Big 12 team last week.
Zwartynski leads the Aggies with a 75.58 stroke average and has posted five top-25 finishes, including a tie for sixth at the Big 12 Championship and a tie for third at the Thompson Invitational. Freeman has a 76.27 average, won the Big 12 Championship and has had three top 10 finishes in her last three starts.
Johnson is appearing in her fourth straight regional and has twice helped the Aggies to the NCAA finals. She is third on the team in scoring at 76.42 and has had three top-20 finishes. She was runner-up at the Thompson Invitational and tied for 10th at the Big 122 Championship. Porter (Memphis) and Smith (Texas Tech) are both in their first year with the program after transferring from other schools. Each has appeared in five tournaments.
The Aggies have had a solid spring season under second-year head coach Trelle McCombs, winning the Dr. Donnis Thompson Invitational in Hawaii and placing second at the Big 12 Championship. The Aggies finished 14th at the PING/Arizona State Invitational at the Karsten Golf Course in Early April.
"Going back to ASU is a great thing for us," McCombs said. "We are taking the momentum we built at the Big 12 tournament into regionals. But having a `survival' mindset will not get us through to nationals; we have to go in with the mindset of winning. That is the only way to approach it. If we play with the heart we showed in Lubbock, we shouldn't have any problems."