The Stetson women's golf team won its first tournament of the 2007-08 season, capturing its own Hatter Fall Classic by six strokes for the first time in school history Monday and Tuesday at Victoria Hills Country Club. Sophomore Lauren Darnell (Gainesville, Ga.) earned second place honors at four over par for 54 holes (76-70-74).
Darnell was the only player in the field of 46 golfers to break par in the second round on Monday, carding 2-under par 70. She was joined in the top five by sophomore Danielle Jackson (Seminole, Fla./Northside Christian HS), who rebounded from a second-round 80 (her first and only non-scoring round of the fall season) to shoot 74 in the final round today to take fifth place at +11.
Junior Ashley Kozlowski (Windsor, Conn.) and freshman Alex Banham (Peterborough, England) were vital parts of Stetson's title-winning efforts. After an opening 82, Kozlowski shot up the standings with rounds of 75 Monday afternoon and even-par 72 on Tuesday, the third-best round of the day in the field, to tie for eighth at +13. One of the players she tied with was Banham, who sandwiched rounds of 75 around a second-round 79 to also finish at +13. Senior Meagan Carlucci (Southlake, Texas) contributed a scoring 78 in the second round in between scores of 81 and 87 to tie for 35th place.
Stetson also fielded a “B” team at the Hatter Fall Classic. The star of the second squad was junior Christine Fraser (Kingston, Ontario, Canada), who tied for sixth place overall with a three-shot improvement each time out (79-76-73=+12). Sophomore Lauren Bryan (Valparaiso, Ind.), junior Jodi Campbell (Birmingham, England) and freshman Lauren Eliopoulos (Akron, Ohio) comprised the rest of the squad with Bryan shooting 88-79-79=+30, Campbell at 81-83-88=+36 and Eliopoulos with 93-88-85=+50.
Praewnapa Phol-Uayporn of Florida Atlantic University used her opening round of three under-par 69 to vault her to the individual title, finishing with 73 and 75 for a +1 overall score, three shots ahead of Darnell. Heather Burgner of reigning Division II national champions Florida Southern took third at +5. Burgner's Moccasins came in with a 908 (+44) score to take second, six strokes behind the Stetson Hatters.
After the Moccasins there was a 23-stroke gap to third place Florida Gulf Coast, followed by a tie between Bethune-Cookman and Florida Atlantic at +69. Jacksonville (+80) was sixth, followed by USC Upstate (+87), Daytona Beach Community College (+95) and the Stetson “B” Team (+128).
The tournament concluded Stetson's fall season; the Hatters open the spring schedule in nearby Daytona Beach at the Bethune-Cookman Spring Invitational Feb. 22-24, 2008.
