That was Bradley women’s golf’s final score after 36 holes at the EKU Colonel Classic on Monday. As their lowest 36-hole score in program history, this record-breaking performance placed the Braves second in the tournament, eight strokes away from first place.
Head coach Halley Morell explained how the team prevailed.
“This course was similar to many of the courses we play here at Bradley,” Morell said. “The grass and rough were very similar as opposed to a couple of tournaments we played the last two weeks in Georgia and Vegas.”
“There was a big comfort level change from most of the girls. We were more comfortable on the greens, chipping, putting out of there, so those aspects contributed greatly to our success,” Morell added.
In the first round, freshman Jillian Cosler and senior Grace Aromando each shot 71s to tie the lowest score of the round, while junior Maria Perakis followed behind with a 76.
Sophomore Allison Pacocha and graduate student Mara Flaherty tied with 80 and junior Kathryn McNease finished with an 81.
In the second round, Pacocha scored a team-low of 70, Cosler shot a 75 and McNease was right behind her with a 76. Perakis got a 78 and Flaherty a 79 with Aromando coming in at 81.
Cosler led all Braves, finishing the meet at +2 to tie her for second place. It’s the highest finish of her career.
“Honestly, I just wanted to go out there and do as best as I could before conference,” Cosler said. “My goal was to use it as a confidence boost. Now I have some confidence going into conference so that I can compete to the best of my ability.”
Bad weather shut down a potential third round, but Cosler is confident she could’ve made a run at first place if she had the chance.
“Absolutely, I felt pretty good that day,” Cosler said. “I was gonna leave it all out there. There was a lot of golf left to play, but I would have liked to see what would have happened.”
Heading home with their best finish since Oct. 7, Morell is glad the team could gain momentum before taking the course for the MVC Championship in nine days.
“Huge, we can’t even quantify it,” Morell said. “The fact that we just beat Illinois State again, and we had some really good scores with three different people shooting under par. So to take that confidence moving into the conference championship is huge.”
The Braves will be back in action on April 14-16 in Waterloo, Illinois for the Missouri Valley Conference Championship.
