The women's golf team traveled to the Mount Holyoke Invitational this past Friday.
Along the way, they played their best overall golf and placed fourth out of seven teams -- their best finish this season -- as they defeated Ivy rivals Yale and Harvard.
"We had our best performance of the season on the first day," Coach Izzy Johnson said. "We had four scores that were really good for all of the players."
Captain Kelly Just '94 shot an opening round of 83 and followed it up with a round of 81, and finished in second place overall with a combined score of 164. Sophomores Sara Vogler, Jami Papa and Morgen Sullivan finished with totals of 181, 197 and 214, respectively.
"Morgen had probably her best round here at Dartmouth," Just said, "and Jami and everyone else on the team is improving. We need to work on our consistency but there's a lot of hope for the Spring season."
Although the Big Green started the meet on a strong note, the team was unable to sustain the momentum.
"We didn't play that well on Sunday," Johnson said, "but that one good day was very encouraging. We're kind of in a rebuilding mode and with a lot of players that don't have a lot of tournament experience, I'm encouraged after that performance and in our improvement."
The team finish was "probably the culmination of a lot of our goals this season and to improve each meet," Sullivan said. "There's a lot of promise and we work well together."
Several players found the course, designed specifically for women, well suited to their game.
"It was a pretty easy course," Vogler said, "so it was disappointing that I didn't shoot better."
"It was a really tight course and my short game came together at times" Papa added. "We're a really young team, so we're finally starting to improve a lot."
As the team looks forward to this weekend's Eastern Conference Athletic Championships at James Madison in Virginia, Johnson looks to prepare her team and sees some room for continued improvement.
"We're going to spend a little more time on our short game," she said, "but I'm sure we'll be competitive at ECACs. I'm encouraged by the progress of our newer players and we have some time over the winter to do some more practice, but it's a young team and we're kind of learning the ropes."
Team members echoed Johnson's statement.
"We expect to make a decent showing," Sullivan said. "Perhaps even go one or two steps further."
"Our team goal is to shoot better than a 360 and that's our best realistic hope right now," Just added. "This was my best finish of the year and hopefully Sara and I can place in the top ten."
