The college golf season is just a little more than a month old, but local Division I teams and players already have chalked up quite a list of highlights, including individual and team victories, countrywide and conference honors, and top-10 national rankings.
Individual tournament champions include the University of Denver’s Stephanie Sherlock (pictured), Northern Colorado’s Stephen Bidne, the Air Force Academy’s Kyle Bailey and Arkansas’ Jamie Marshall, a resident of Castle Rock.
Meanwhile, the Colorado State and Air Force men, along with the DU women, have claimed one team title each.
Several local schools and individuals have garnered national attention for their early-season performances. The DU women, who finished fifth in the 2009 NCAA Championships, are ranked 18th in the nation by Golfweek magazine, while the CSU men are 21st.
Marshall, a Regis High School graduate, was named Golf World magazine’s male college player of the week in its Oct. 5 issue after shooting a final-round 65 to claim his first college victory, in the Wolverine tournament.
Broomfield’s Steve Ziegler, who this year became the first player since 1985 to win both the CGA Match Play and Stroke Play championships in the same year, is ranked the fifth-best men’s college player in the nation by Golfweek. The Stanford junior finished sixth in his first college tournament of the season. Ziegler was a quarterfinalist in the 2009 U.S. Amateur, losing to eventual champion Byeong-Hun An.
Denver’s Becca Huffer, a sophomore at Notre Dame, earned Big East Golfer of the Month honors for September after finishing a career-best fifth in the recent Windy City Collegiate. Huffer, the conference’s Rookie of the Year in 2008-09, has posted two other top-15 performances in her first three events.
Last month, DU senior Sherlock won the Ron Moore Women’s Intercollegiate at Highlands Ranch Golf Club for the third straight year. Sherlock, who placed 11th individually at the 2009 NCAA Finals, led the Pioneers to the team title in their season opener.
Sherlock and freshman teammate Kimberly Kim, the 2006 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion, were two of the nation’s top 10 female players to watch in Golf World’s preseason assessment. After two tournaments, Kim is ranked 30th nationally among women’s college players, according to Golfweek. She’s finished fourth and ninth in her first two college tournaments, and the 68 she shot Sunday in the Tar Heel Invitational tied for ninth-lowest round in the history of DU women’s golf.
UNC’s Bidne, a junior, scored a big victory at the Air Force Academy’s Falcon Invitational, which featured all of the men’s Division I teams in the state. It’s one of two top-five finishes Bidne has posted this season.
For the second straight year, Colorado State claimed the team title at the Falcon Invitational, continuing to build on the momentum of the Rams’ five-victory 2008-09 season. Sophomore Zahkai Brown, the 2007 Colorado 5A state high school champion, has posted two third-place finishes so far for CSU.
Bailey, a junior at Air Force, recently won his first college tournament, helping the Falcons earn the team title at the Service Academy Golf Classic which features the best players from the nation’s four service academies (Air Force, Army, Navy and Merchant Marines).
Meanwhile, several Colorado players attending out-of-state schools — in addition to Marshall, Ziegler and Huffer — have posted top-10 finishes in the last month. That includes Wyoming’s Zach Zaremba, Kansas’ Alex Gutesha and Princeton’s Olivia Garard.
