Upstate Opens Season at Great Smokies Intercollegiate
9/12/2014 12:00:00 AM | Women's Golf
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Spartanburg, S.C. – The USC Upstate women's golf team will open the 2014-15 season this weekend playing in the Great Smokies Intercollegiate Saturday and Sunday at the Waynesville Inn and Golf Club.
The Great Smokies Intercollegiate will be played on the Blue Ridge and Carolina courses with the two 9-hole layouts combining for a total yardage of 5,943 yards and playing at par-72. The entire resort was designed by Donald Ross. Upstate is one of seven teams playing in the tournament, which is being hosted by Western Carolina. In addition to the Spartans and Catamounts, The Citadel, Mercer, Presbyterian, Sandhills Community College and Western Kentucky will vie for the team championship.
Upstate will make its sixth appearance in the tournament. The Spartans claimed a tie for 13th in 2012, turning in their second-best effort in event after finishing tied for ninth in 2009. Rachel Reiling and Malika Allie are the only two Spartans on this year's team to have played in any of the previous tournaments. Reiling posted one of her career-best rounds of 76 in the first round of the 2012 event.
Upstate head coach Todd Lawton will send the lineup of Rachel Reiling, Allea Hawkins, Sidney Dermody, Malika Allie and Payton Culler into action this weekend. Reiling, Hawkins and Allie played in every tournament for the Spartans last season. Reling and Hawkins turned in two of the top three scoring averages on the team last year with Reiling leading the Spartans with an 80.6 stroke average and Hawkins ranking third at 82.0 as a freshman. Reiling was steady throughout the season and recorded her best career finish with a 13th-place effort in the Eat-A-Peach Classic. Hawkins burst onto the scene by becoming the first women's college golfer, at least in recent history, to record a hole-in-one in back-to-back tournaments to start her career. Allie came on strong at the end of the season. Dermody and Culler are freshmen who will suit up for the first time in their Upstate careers.
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