No. 4-ranked Arizona was named the No. 1 seed on April 27 for the 2015 NCAA Regionals in South Bend, Ind.
“We’ve played in Chicago in the fall, and we always do well there, and Lindsey Weaver transferred from Notre Dame,” Arizona coach Laura Ianello said. “She’ll be able to give us a little insight on the golf course, which will be great.”
The Wildcats appear to have a favorable bracket. However, Arizona will have a handful of teams breathing down its neck. Even though over half of the teams in the field are not ranked in the top 25, according to golfstat.com, Arizona will be tested.
The Notre Dame regional will include No. 5 Duke, No. 12 Oklahoma State, No. 13 Wake Forest, No. 20 UC Davis, No. 23 Pepperdine, Tulane, Notre Dame, Purdue, Kent State, Louisville, San Jose State, North Carolina, Kentucky, Harvard, Troy, Eastern Kentucky and Youngstown State.
The bracket is a favorable field of play for Arizona, considering the Wildcats just won the 2015 Pac-12 Championship last week against teams such as No. 1 USC, No. 3 UCLA, No. 6 Washington, No. 16 Stanford and No. 19 ASU.
If Arizona can win in the best conference in golf, the Wildcats should be able to contend against the teams in the Notre Dame regional.
“They deserve to be that No. 1 seed after winning conference this year and beating out USC, UCLA and Washington,” Ianello said. “We looked at the competition that is going to be at this regional. We sized it up.”
The Wildcats will rely heavily on the insight of Weaver, and the junior is looking forward to prove that she transferred from Notre Dame to Arizona to win a national championship. Weaver transferred from the Fighting Irish after her freshman season.
Weaver’s success at Notre Dame was off the charts, as she was named Big East Freshman of the Year and was placed on the All-Big East First Team along with being the No. 1 ranked golfer in the country at the end of the fall season.
“I’m excited to go back to Notre Dame,” Weaver said. “I do know that the course can get pretty hard, and the greens are sometimes tricky, but I think I will be able to give my team some helpful tips heading into regionals.”
The Wildcats will play match-play rather than stroke play at the NCAA Regional.
Match-play is scored between only two players, and whoever has the best score on the hole wins the hole.
“Coach Laura and coach Derek [Radley] have prepared us well by doing match-play drills out at practice,” Weaver said. “A lot of us have experience playing match stroke, so I feel like we will be well ready to head into nationals.”
Arizona will have to adjust accordingly, but at this point in the season, championship squads adjust on a dime. The NCAA Regionals begin Thursday.
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