Colorado Places 10th At The Jim West Challenge

SAN MARCOS, Texas — The University of Colorado women’s golf team had its best of three rounds at the Jim West Challenge, but dropped one spot in the standings to finish 10^th at 15-over-par, 879, on Monday at the Kissing Tree Golf Club.
 
Monday’s round of 3-over, 291, was Colorado’s third best in relation to par of the fall season, but was only the ninth best of the day in the field. Oklahoma State won the team title at 9-under, 855, two strokes better than SMU at 7-under.
 
Colorado got off to a great start. Beginning the round between tees No. 16 and 18 with the shotgun start, the Buffaloes combined for six birdies on those first three holes. Colorado continued to have success early, playing the first four holes of the front nine at 3-under, moving up to the fifth-place range at the mid-point of the round.
 
“We started out well this morning, we were 7-under for quite a while, but then ran into some trouble,” Colorado head coach Anne Kelly said. “The finish is not what we wanted, but the team continues to learn and we’ll keep working to improve.”
 
The Buffaloes begin to slide toward the turn. While Colorado was able to avoid the big numbers – only one hole higher than bogey in the entire round – the Buffaloes were held without a birdie on a nine-hole stretch beginning at No. 5 and unable to climb in the standings.
 
Sophomore Lauren Gooding was Colorado’s top finisher, tying for 11^th place overall at 2-under. After a pair of even rounds on Sunday, Gooding birdied the two par-4s out of the gate at No. 16 and No. 18 to quickly get to 2-under. She had a pair of bogeys later in the round, but in each instance answered with a birdie on the next hole to shoot 70 and solidify her third top 20 finish in four fall tournaments.
 
Gooding’s 54-hole total of 214 is her collegiate best and is Colorado’s low tournament for this fall season.
 
Graduate Haylin Harris and sophomore Natalie Vo tied for 43^rd overall at 7-over, 223. Harris had Colorado’s best single round of the tournament on Monday at 3-under, 69.
 
Shaking off a pair of 77s in the first two rounds, Harris birdied the first three, and four of her first five holes to vault to 4-under on the day. She fell back to 1-under with three bogeys in…