Kennesaw State women’s golf team won their third Atlantic Sun Conference title under coach Rhyll Brinsmead on April 24, 2018, and looked set to continue their success with many returning players for this season.
The Owls headed into this season as the 48th-ranked team in the nation, with only one player having graduated from the previous year’s team and only one freshman.
Henriette Nielsen graduated in 2018 after a successful career of several accolades, including a First Team All-Conference selection her senior year, a Second Team selection her junior year and the ASUN Freshman of the Year title.
The new addition to the roster is freshman Chloe Thornton, who hails from Australia where she won multiple events on the junior circuit.
The team had five returning players on the roster, including First Team All-Conference player Madison Caldwell. She led the team from the previous season with five top-10 finishes and three top-five finishes.
Despite Caldwell’s ability to stand out, the team required all players to put in maximum effort to win the conference last season and will require such efforts to take the team further on the national level this year.
In late September, the team set out for their first tournament of the season at the Lady Paladin Invitational in Greenville, South Carolina, finishing in third place.
Caldwell led KSU by finishing 12th overall of a field of 95 players, but the subsequent tournaments would show the versatility of the team.
The newest payer of the team proved her skills at the historic Medinah Country Club, as Thornton posted a 5-under, finishing 10th.
Redshirt junior Clara Aveling also played well at Medinah but played her best golf at the following tournament during the Magnolia Invitational.
Aveling, along with senior and First Team All-Conference player Roanne Tomlinson, finished tied for third place with 3-under finishes at the event hosted by Ole Miss.
With their help, the Owls won their first tournament as a team this season.
Seniors Charlotte Charrayre and Medy Thavong have posted season-best scores of 1-over so far.
As impressive as the season-best finishes have been for her players, Brinsmead is particularly proud of the team’s performance in what was statistically their worst tournament at the Alexa Stirling Intercollegiate.
Despite finishing in fifth place out of 11 teams, the team’s aggregate score after three rounds was 41-over, a full 27 strokes over their next-worst showing. The team fought tough conditions and less than ideal surfaces to finish better than they had started the tournament.
“The toughness [they showed] was a really good lesson in never giving up,” Brinsmead said. “This team has a really gritty mentality … we don’t hit the furthest, we’re by no means the big-name recruits, but they find a way to get it done.”
During the winter break before the team’s first tournament of the new year at the UCF challenge, Caldwell left the team to pursue her goals of turning pro, leaving the future of the team in the hands of the remaining players.
Despite losing such a crucial player, the team was unfazed as they set a new school record score of a combined 9-under, placing fifth at the UCF Challenge and beating some ranked teams.
The win allowed the team to climb the rankings as the No. 32 team in the nation, now above in-state rival, the University of Georgia. Aveling led the way at UCF with a 5-under for the tournament, while Thornton also played well with a 3-under total.
Next, the women’s golf team will travel to Florida to participate in the Moon Golf Invitational from Feb. 18 to Feb. 19.
