Senior Noemi Jimenez led at one point on the final day of the Pac-12 women’s golf championship but finished the tournament in fourth place on Wednesday. ASU finished in ninth place overall at the conference tournament.
The Sun Devils finished the three rounds with a 30-over 882 as a team and finished ahead of only two teams, California and Washington State. Arizona took the win on Wednesday finishing with a 1-over 853. The Wildcats take home both a conference championship and a Territorial Cup Series point over the Sun Devils.
The Sun Devils had their best round of the tournament as a team on Wednesday, shooting 4-over as a team in the final round, but could not dig themselves out of the hole of the first two rounds.
The bright spot for the Sun Devils this week was Jimenez who played in her final conference tournament. Jimenez scored an eagle in both the first and second rounds of the tournament, shooting a 2-under 69 and a 1-under 70 respectively to being the tournament.
During the final day Jimenez was tied for the lead at one point but eventually finished in fourth place after shooting a 1-under 70 in the final round and finishing with a 4-under 209. Jimenez finished three strokes behind the tournaments winner Oregon's Caroline Inglis. The fourth place finish matches Jimenez’s best finish she scored at last year’s event. It was also the first time since the Stanford Intercollegiate that Jimenez finished under par this year.
This finish comes off the heels of the announcement that Jimenez is this year’s Pac-12 women’s golf scholar-athlete of the year. The announcement was made on Sunday evening before the tournament’s start on Monday morning.
Sophomore Monica Vaughn could not follow up her first tournament win at the PING/ASU Invitational last week with another solid performance as she finished tied for 32nd with a 10-over 223 and the second best score on the team. Vaughn’s best round was Tuesday where she finished even with two birdies. She had five birdies over the three rounds.
Close behind Vaughn were freshmen Roberta Liti and Sophia Zeeb who both finished tied for 35th in their first appearance in the Pac-12 tournament, shooting a 12-over 225. Both finished with five birdies.
Lastly for the Sun Devils, freshman Ashleigh Greenham finished 49th in the tournament shooting a 20-over 233 and had just three birdies this week. Greenham finished the tournament strongly with a 3-over 74 on Wednesday after starting the tournament off with a 9-over and 8-over scores in the first two rounds.
ASU now plays the waiting game. On Monday, April 27 the NCAA announces its regional selections live on the Golf Channel. The NCAA Regionals will begin on May 7 and ASU could be playing in Raleigh, North Carolina, South Bend, Indiana, San Antonio, Texas, or St. George, Utah.
Reach the reporter at wslane@asu.edu or follow @bill_slane on Twitter.
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