• The KillerFrogs

TCU Golf 2020-2021

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women are on the course to begin their spring slate in the Lamkin Invitational at The Farms Golf Club north of San Diego. They'll play 36 today; 18 tomorrow.

Course has a reputation for playing tough, and the 11-team field includes one of the top 3 teams in the country in USC, along with San Diego State and UCLA. Frogs are paired with Tulane and New Mexico today.

It's a home game for freshman Sabrina Nguyen, from nearby Escondido, who is playing in the 2 spot. Also in the lineup are Lau, Iqbal, Pacheco and Park.

Scoring here: http://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=21599
 
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JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women with a strong first round in California. At +11, they are solo second, 4 shots back of USC. Colorado, San Diego State and UCLA are within 3 shots of the Frogs for second; other teams 10 shots back or more.

Sabrina Nguyen led Frogs at even par (T3); Lois Lau was also in the top 10 at +2; Sabrina Iqbal was a shot further back.

My only quibble is that this team is consistently slow out of the gate. Frogs shot +7 (counting scores) through their first four holes. USC was even through the same stretch. Frogs were 3 shots better than the Trojans the rest of the way. This team is capable but needs to manage the early nerves.

Second round underway.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women shoot a second straight round of +11 but slip to 5th after each of the teams immediately behind the Frogs has a player shoot 66--three shots better than any other score posted through two rounds. So, hat tip to Colorado and San Diego State for gaining ground. Frogs will have a run at them tomorrow--TCU is closer to 1st (13 shots) than 6th (20 shots).

Lau, Iqbal and Nguyen are all in the top 20.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Frogs passed Colorado and San Diego State early, then caught UCLA late to finish T2 in the Lamkin Invitational. A very good result.

Given the scores, round-3 conditions must have been challenging. TCU's +18 score wasn't great, but it was five shots better than all other teams not named USC. Credit a total team effort for the finish, as four Frogs finished in the top 20, led by Sabrina Iqbal (T8), Lois Lau (T10) and Sabrina Nguyen (T14).

TCU began the day 7 back of UCLA. When one Bruin shot herself out of it early (+11 through 6), the race was on to see if the Frogs could chase them down. They did, but TCU's bid for solo second was frustrated when the top two Bruins birdied the last to match the Frogs.

TCU women will be back in action on 2/22 at The Woodlands.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU men open play today in the Coachella Valley at The Prestige tournament. It's 54 holes over 3 days on the Greg Norman course at La Quinta. Big field of 24 teams, highlighted by pre-Covid-#1 Pepperdine, Pac-12 powers Arizona State, Stanford, and USC, and a handful of other strong teams, including San Diego State, Texas Tech and SMU.

Frogs have won this tournament three times but haven't played in it since 2013. TCU is starting Fernandez de Oliveira, Oleson, Frimodt, Gums and Berzina. A finish in the top 8 would be a good showing.

Scoring link: http://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=21240

Several teams brought extra players to take part in a related individual tournament at nearby Coral Mountain Golf Club, but TCU is not among them.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Frog men get off to a decent start in the desert. Like the women, they had first-hole jitters and were +2 as a team on the opening hole (1 double, 1 triple on a not-difficult hole). But they settled in and went just +3 the rest of the way. That puts them in the middle of the pack (T11); more than half of the field sitting between +3 and +7.

The only team to get any separation was Arizona State who, playing alongside the Frogs, went -6 on the final three holes to shoot -8, opening a 5-shot lead.

None of the Frogs shot more than +3, which was great considering the bad first hole. The Frogs were led by Mateo F de O, who shot -1. A good round (T16 individually) that maybe didn't seem as good to Mateo, whose playing partner David Puig shot 64 for ASU--best round of the day by 3 shots.

Lots of golf left.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
That'll teach me to post before the round is over. Frogs were -4 as a team through 16 holes and then crashed, going +8 on the last two holes. A round of +4 isn't terrible, but they'll be thinking about the strokes they gave away at the end. Oleson is at -3, which is T3 overall with a lot of players still on the course.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Frogs are on the course for the final round of The Prestige. TCU's Danish duo went a combined -6 yesterday, with Oleson and Frimodt both posting career-best 68s. Oleson has a chance at the tournament title today; he is 3 off the pace of fellow Scandinavian Ludvig Aberg (Texas Tech).

Frogs today begin at T7 as a team, and are mostly playing to defend ground. Nine teams tied or trailing the Frogs were within 7 shots to begin the day, while only 1 team ahead of the Frogs was within 7 shots (Tech). On top of that, several of the chasing teams are playing in the morning wave, with calmer winds.

TCU will do well to maintain its position--would take a really good round to make the top 5. TCU tends to get consistent performance from its international players in competition--hoping for a meaningful contribution today from one or both of the domestic players.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Winner!


Congrats to Jacob! Gustav Frimodt also had a good finish (T12) for the Frogs, who held onto 7th place as a team. TCU passed Texas Tech but couldn't quite stay in front of Stanford, which made hay in the early wave. All the teams that placed ahead of TCU were top-15 squads, and the Frogs beat some quality programs including Tech, USC, and San Diego State.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women are on the course at the ICON Invitational at the Golf Club of Houston in Humble.

There's a bunch of good teams in the 13-team field, including UT, Oklahoma State, Northwestern, and Baylor.

Frogs keeping the same lineup they used in their T2 finish last week: Iqbal, Lau, Nguyen, Park and Pacheco.

I offered a quibble last week about the women's team being consistently slow out of the gate. That is not the case today--three players are under par in their first 3-5 holes, and TCU has a share of the early lead at -4.

Scoring: http://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=21628
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women completed Round 1 of the ICON at -3, good for a share of third place as a team, and ahead of highly ranked Texas and Baylor. It was as clean of a round as I've seen TCU post--not a single double-bogey on any of the five cards, and four of the five shot even or better. Lois Lau had the best round of the bunch, a 2-under 70.

While it was a great start, there's a lot still to be done. The field is tightly bunched, with 10 teams within 8 shots of the lead after one round. Frogs are now halfway through Round 2 and have dropped a couple of shots to par and a couple of places on the leaderboard. But a top-five finish would be good, given the strength of the field.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women shot even par in Round 2, which has them 5th in the team standings. Given that all teams ahead of them are in the top 20, and all are within 9 shots through 36 holes, that is a good day's work. Frogs lead Texas, which has two of the top 15 amateurs in the world. It was a total team effort, with all five Frogs in the top half of the field. Best is freshman Sabrina Nguyen, T10, who shot an afternoon 69. Final round tomorrow with shotgun start at 8.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women earn a strong 4th-place finish at the ICON after a wild last round. It was a birdiefest early, with the top eight teams all under par at one point. It looked like the Frogs would be in a three-team race for 3rd with Houston and Oklahoma State, but Northwestern (-9 through 4 holes) quickly made it a four-team battle.

TCU was -8 for the day at one point, which would have been a single-round record had it held, but the wind came up and so did the scores.

In the end, the Frogs finished even on the day, -3 for the tournament. No top-10 finishers, but four players in the top 30. Last week they placed well on a difficult course; this week they placed well on a course set up for scoring. Among the teams they beat by at least six shots: Houston, Tech, UT, SMU and A&M.

It was a sneaky strong field, as perennial contender Texas discovered, finishing 10th. TCU bested UT all three days. Horns were missing Kaitlin Papp, but she would not have been enough to make up half of their 34-stroke deficit to the winning team.

The team from Waco edged LSU for the win, although Oklahoma State would have won had it not left the tournament winner on the bench to compete as an individual. In a major I'll-show-you-coach statement, Okie Light's Rina Tatematsu shot -14 to win by three.

The rankings are still wonky since so many schools didn't play in the fall--but TCU looks like a legit top-25 team. Next up for the women is the Longbow Invitational in Scottsdale, March 12-14.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
New Golfstat team rankings have TCU women 19th and the men 38th. Seems about right for the ladies, who have built some depth and gotten good contributions from both freshmen. The starters will all be back next season and the incoming South African recruit sets them up for another good year.

Harder to tell with the men, who have another week off before playing 6 times in 7 weeks. With so much internal competition for playing time, I don't expect a lot of week-to-week continuity, which points to inconsistent results in the short term. But don't be surprised if they get stronger at Big 12 and NCAA tourney time. If newcomer Celli settles in, the lineup of him, Oleson, F de O, Frimodt and Laussot looks like a top-25 team this year and next.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU men will take on a small field of mostly Texas teams at the Trinity Forest Invitational, beginning Sunday. Not much wind expected on the wide-open track until Tuesday's final round.

TCU should be competitive here. The main competition is SMU and North Texas--both ranked in the top 20. Frogs and Ponies split their first two spring events. University of North Texas hasn't played since October, when they beat the Frogs by 25 on their home course at Maridoe. UTSA, Sam Houston State and Little Rock are also capable.

Freshman Filippo Celli is back in the lineup for TCU; he stumbled in qualifying for the Prestige after taking out top-50 amateur Noah Goodwin in his first collegiate round. Frogs will also start Fernandez de Oliveira, Oleson, Frimodt and Gums, who topped the group in qualifying.

Follow scoring here: http://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=21237
 
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