Comeback Card Close It Out – Stanford Cardinal

FORT WORTH, Texas — After heading into the final round three strokes off the lead, top-ranked Stanford women’s golf showed its greatest resiliency of the season in the face of adversity. The Card battled through the par-70 course at Colonial Country Club to erase a three-stroke deficit and win the Charles Schwab Women’s Collegiate, the only team to finish the tournament at par.

Stanford trailed most of the afternoon in the Texas heat, trying to track down both No. 3 Oregon and No. 9 Wake Forest. The Demon Deacons fell off the pace and shot 6-over in the final round, setting up a battle between former Pac-12 foes for the tournament championship. With about four holes remaining, the Cardinal took the lead over the Ducks for the first time all week and avoided mistakes on the final holes to secure the win.

Stanford even with par for the week, the only team to hit that mark, as Oregon finished 2-over No. 19 Auburn climbed up to third overall at 6-over as a team. Stanford’s 3-under in the final round was the best of the day by any team in the field and tied for the best round of the entire tournament by any team in the 15-team field.

This marks the sixth win of the season for Stanford, tying the 2020-21 and 2021-22 teams that also had six wins. Only the 2022-23 team had more tournaments in one season (7). Stanford also has won every stroke play tournament it has entered this year, and with three postseason tournaments remaining, is attempting to join the 1995 Arizona State Sun Devils as the only teams to complete an unbeaten season.

Perhaps the biggest reason for Stanford jumping to the top spot was the performance of Megha Ganne during the final round. She moved up 17 spots to a tie for 11^th overall with an impressive 3-under 67 in the final round. The back nine was clean with three birdies, and she overcame a 4-over start to the week to finish with a 1-over 211 across three rounds. Her 67 in the final round was tied for the second-lowest round of the day, behind individual medalist Anna Davis and her 6-under 64.

Continuing her impressive run all week was Meja Örtengren, who finished in fourth at the Charles Schwab Women’s Collegiate after an even 70 in the final round. Things were a bit steadier for Örtengren than during the first two rounds, where she had a lot of circles on the scorecard. Still, the freshman out of Sweden was able to string together a 69-67-70-206 to finish 4-under. It is already the fifth top-five finish of the season for…