Monday was a day of season bests as the Florida women’s golf team finished on top of the leaderboard after an explosive second round at the Allstate Sugar Bowl Intercollegiate Golf Championship in New Orleans.
Not only is UF leading the tournament by seven strokes heading into the final round, but three of the five golfers in the team’s lineup saw significant improvements in their standings.
"I’m happy with the day. Overall, I thought we were really solid out there," UF coach Emily Glaser said in a release.
"I’m probably the most pleased with how we stuck to our strategy and played smart golf."
The biggest push from Florida came from junior Kelly Grassel. The Chesterton, Indiana, native finished with a season-best 3 under par.
Her six-shot improvement from day one — which was due in large part to four birdies on Monday — led to a Round 2 score of 3 under par.
After moving up 20 spots on the individual leaderboard, Grassel finished the day in a tie for 18th place.
Following an impressive first round in which she finished tied for second place at 3 under par, junior Maria Torres wasn’t able to sustain her momentum.
She followed her round 1 performance with a Round 2 score of 1 under par and dropped one spot into third place.
Torres stands two strokes behind Stanford’s Lauren Kim and one stroke behind Alabama’s Emma Talley.
Joining Torres in the top 10, junior Karolina Vlckova finished tied for seventh place with a score of 2 under par.
Vlckova jumped up seven spots after improving from an even par first round to a score of 2 under par. The junior earned three birdies on the back nine.
Just outside of the top 10, sophomore Taylor Tomlinson also aided in the Gators’ first-place finish in Round 2, improving from even to 1 under par from one round to the next.
Unlike the rest of her team, freshman Sam Wagner was unable to get anything going on either day.
The Windermere native was unable to improve her first-round score of 3 over par and finished with the same score after the second round.
Wagner fell from a share of 38th place to a share of 48th place.
The Gators play their final round of the tournament tomorrow at 9 a.m.
"Tomorrow we will go out and focus on ourselves, not the field, and try to win the day," Glaser said.
"I’m excited for the opportunity we have in front of us."
Contact Alfredo Morales at amorales@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @amorales_95.
Kelly Grassel lines up a shot during the 2015 SunTrust Gator Invitational at UF's Mark Bostick Golf Course.
