When you ask the women's golf team who has the best shot on a basketball court, the hands of Elise Houtz and Whitney Pyle immediately shoot into the air, and the team breaks down laughing. The moment embodies both camaraderie and competition, and it mirrors the attitude of the players perfectly.

Head coach Kristi Knight challenged the ladies before the summer to work on their short games, and on the first day of practice she made the challenge more specific. She asked them to create a putting game that would be a golf version of knockout.

The team's trips to the Rec for knockout games began because circumstances prevented the girls from getting to golf one day. The circumstances included snow — so much of it that the ladies couldn't get to the course.

Within five minutes of the coach's request, though, the team had created a golf version of knockout and had an intense game in progress.

"It gets them thinking, gets them talking," Knight said. "There's nothing better than that; they're having fun trying to make putts. It's confidence. They're laughing, they don't want to stop, so I like so far the energy that I've seen."

The short game had been a bit of a thorn in the side for the team last season, so the knockout game gave an opportunity to work competitively on putting without the pressure of a game situation.

"If you know at what pace you deliver, you can read greens," Knight said. "If your pace is inconsistent, if one hole you hit it firm, and the next hole you die it in ... it makes it hard for you to read putts. Your pace determines how you read putts."

In college golf, official practices cannot begin until school does. However, that did not stop any of the ladies on the team from getting out to Colbert Hills Golf Course and working on their own.

"I do a lot of chipping games," said Pyle, sophomore. "I try to challenge myself; if I get these up and down, I get something. That's how I work best."

Houtz's automatic response was she practices like she plays.

"Put yourself in real situations that would actually happen on the course," the senior said.

Having worked individually for several months now, the women are confident in their own abilities and those of their teammates.

"We all have the drive to be the best, I think," Pyle said.

Misenhelter agreed everyone has a shot at No. 1.

While last year's leaders Abbi Sunner and Morgan Moon are gone to graduation, the ladies describe their team as deep and talented. Knight seems to agree.

"If they commit, and I believe they will, if they commit to bringing their best every day, and being accountable and holding each other accountable, they're going to even have more fun because it's fun and it's a great journey and experience as they accomplish things as a group," Knight said.

The women's golf team begins its season with the Chip-N-Club Invitational Sept. 13 in Lincoln, Neb.