After her first-round tied for fourth-lowest in school history, senior golfer Niamh McSherry finished in the top-five with a 1-under par (215) after the final round of the Branch Law Firm/Dick McGuire Invitational on Monday.
McSherry’s placement was her best of the season, wrapping up the final round 6-over par (78).
McSherry shined, but the Wildcats failed to move up in the leaderboard. Coming into the final round the Kansas State women’s golf team was only three strokes from first but dropped down to eighth after a disappointing last day.
“The team played good, solid golf for the first 36 holes,” head coach Kristi Knight said in a K-State Athletics press release. “We put ourselves in a great position to succeed in the final round, but today we did not play good golf.”
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Sophomore Haley Vargas was another bright spot for the team’s dismal final day, posting a 1-over par (73) round on Monday. She finished 11-over par (227) for the tournament. Vargas managed to improve 16 spots on the final day, tying for 40th for the tournament — it was the best round of the day for K-State.
The remaining Wildcats were met with dismay as their scores ballooned in the final outing. Reid Issac, who was six strokes behind Vargas on Monday, finished her final regular-season tournament 8-over par (224) and tied for 31st. Freshman Napua Glossner shot 9-over par (225) and junior Heather Fortushniak placed 58th at 19-over par (235).
“I am sorry for the ladies after a strong first day,” Knight said. “I know they have been working hard and really wanted it today. They put themselves in a place to succeed and they wanted to play well, but we just had too many errant shots to put together a good team score.”
K-State’s next outing will be at the 2021 Big 12 Championship, which runs from Sunday through Tuesday, at the Club at Carlton Woods in The Woodlands, Texas. K-State has never won the Big 12 golf championship in men’s or women’s play and will look to make history this weekend.
“After a day like today, the only thing to do is bounce back,” Knight said.
