Women's Golf In Orlando For First Spring Tourney

UCF Challenge
Eagle Creek Golf Club | Orlando, Fla.

The North Texas women's golf team will get back to tournament competition after a few months off, as the Mean Green head to the Sunshine State to take on the loaded field at the UCF Challenge after a strong finish to their fall schedule.

THE EVENT: Eagle Creek Golf Club will play as a par-72 course at 6,379 yards. The teams will play 18 holes per day on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday with tee times each day off the first and 10th holes.

THE FIELD: There are 18 teams participating in the tournament, including 11 top-50 teams and two inside the top-10: No. 42 College of Charleston, No. 23 Iowa State, Kansas, No. 31 Kentucky, No. 20 Kent State, No. 44 Miami, No. 43 Michigan State, No. 11 Mississippi State, North Florida, No. 37 Northwestern, Old Dominion, Penn State, No. 6 Texas A&M, No. 28 UCF, UNC-Wilmington, UNT, Virginia Tech and No. 2 Wake Forest.

REPRESENTING UNT: Competing for the Mean Green will be Shreya Pal, Ellie Roth, Audrey Tan, Patricia Sinolungan, Sakura Sugiyama and Emilie Ricaud. Sugiyama and Ricaud will compete for the fifth spot in Saturday's practice round, while the other will compete in the tournament as an individual.

RESULTS: Live scoring and final results will be posted on Golfstat. A full recap will be posted on MeanGreenSports.com at the end of each day.

AKERS SAYS: "We are fortunate to begin our season at the UCF Challenge in Orlando," head coach Michael Akers said. "It is cool to see the name of the event still intact from when I served as the assistant coach at UCF back in 2005 and 2006. The UCF coach and I traded invites for our events, which works out great for both programs. The ladies have done some great things in practice this month but the recent weather has hurt our preparations. Fortunately the ladies have Bruzzy's to utilize no matter what the weather does.

Shreya won our qualifier and has looked great. Ellie Roth seems to be back in her old form so we are excited to see her in competition. I'm sure Audrey and Patty will play well at Eagle Creek, as the course sets up good for them. The field is very solid so we have a great opportunity to improve our national ranking."

MOVING UP: North Texas has made significant strides since head coach Michael Akers took over seven years ago. The Mean Green were ranked No. 201 following the 2015-16 season, and since Akers arrived in Denton, UNT has soared more than 150 spots from that time. The Mean Green are now consistently ranked in the top 50 nationally.

THE GOAT: Lauren Cox, who graduated in Spring 2021 to finish off her stellar five-year Mean Green career, has attained partial status on the Epson Tour for the 2022 season, and she's currently on staff as a volunteer assistant coach.

UP NEXT: The Mean Green will travel to Houston for the ICON Invitational, which has become a staple on their annual schedule, on Feb. 27-28.

NEW FACILITY: The Mean Green golf programs are thrilled to have the new Bruzzy's UNT Golf Practice Facility, which is a $3 million on-campus facility that features state-of-the-art technology, such as TrackMan, swing catalysts, indoor hitting bays, a short-game area and a PuttView indoor putting green.

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Players Mentioned

Shreya Pal

Emilie Ricaud

Ellie Roth

Patricia Sinolungan

Sakura Sugiyama

Audrey Tan

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