Fall Season Ends with Four Wins in Four Tournaments

After dominating throughout the fall season, it was more of the same from the Harvard women’s golf team this weekend.

At the Lehigh Invitational, the Crimson paced through the field with rounds of 315 and 321 to notch its fourth victory in four tournaments this year.

Now Harvard is confident it can carry this success through the offseason and into the spring, when the team will be favored to pick up a second consecutive Ivy championship.

“It’s definitely great to get these results, but this is by no means our aim,” junior Claire Sheldon said. “We go into every tournament [wanting] to play our best. This was a more difficult golf course, so these scores are a little high, but it’s definitely a big confidence builder for next year.”

Four victories in four tournaments meets the expectations Harvard set for itself; nonetheless, this fall season deserves a lot of merit.

The team’s first victory came at the Dartmouth Invitational, as the Crimson came in first with scores of 314 and 302. Freshman standout Christine Cho was the star that weekend, tying for the individual championship by shooting a four-over 148 on the two rounds.

Harvard won the team title by nine, tallying a 616 compared with the Big Green’s 625 in the 17-team competition.

The following weekend at the Princeton Invitational, the squad finished first out of 16 teams to capture the crown. Cho again was the top Crimson scorer, leading Harvard to a narrow Sunday victory over the Tigers.

At the invitational, the Tigers stunned the field by breaking 300 on day one, shooting an incredible 298 to Harvard’s solid effort of 302. But Princeton dropped off on Sunday, opening the door for the Crimson, who shot a 311 to pull out the victory.

Harvard gained its third victory of the fall season at the Yale Fall Intercollegiate behind a great round from Sheldon, who shot a two-over 73 to pace the squad.

Yesterday, the team was able to continue its winning ways.

“I think we were definitely happy about our performance this season,” captain Ali Bode said. “We took it one step at a time. Now, going into the off season, we’re looking forward to more training—last year we won Ivies, and it’s our goal to repeat.”

The scores posted by Harvard over the weekend were lower than expected. Many factors worked against the Crimson, including the wet conditions and long, slow rounds that resulted. For example, Sheldon played 21 holes yesterday, more than the team is trained for at this point in the year. In the spring, individuals can play up to 36 holes a day, but then again, this is not the spring.

“The course is a tremendous course, very difficult,” Bode said. “The greens are very fast, so if your approach shot is not in the correct place, it’s very easy to make bogies. Compared to the field, everyone in the top five did well.”

Every team had the play through the conditions, so the team took it in stride.

“We didn’t have much of a choice, and we tried to roll with it,” Sheldon said. “It was definitely a much longer day, but this was by no means the longest.”

Now the defending Ivy champs can take some time off, take a breather, and after hitting the links, begin to hit the books.

“We’re taking a couple weeks off to put in couple of extra hours into schoolwork,” Sheldon said. “It’s starting to pile up.”

—Staff writer Walter E. Howell can be reached at wehowell@fas.harvard.edu.