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Leina improves her 2013 finish
Leina Kim overcame a bogey on the opening hole to tally a 2-over 74 in Saturday’s final round of the NCAA Division II Women’s Golf Championship at the Meadows Golf Course in Allendale, Michigan.
Leina Kim finished out strong in the final round of the NCAA Division II Women’s Golf Championship to improve to 13th place from 28th two years ago.
(CSU-Pueblo)
It was only the second time that Kim shot 2-over in the four rounds she played in the Grand Valley State University-hosted event to finish tied for 12th place. She had an overall score of 18-over 306.
The Colorado State University-Pueblo junior, according to the Lady ThunderWolves website, was five shots behind the leaders in the second round with a 2-over 74 tally but dropped eight spots after limping with an 8-over 80 the follow
ing day.
Kim, despite failing to shoot an under-par round, improved her 28th place finish in her freshman season two years ago to conclude her remarkable third season as a Lady ThunderWolf.
Her 18-over 306 score after Saturday’s final round also eclipsed her 20-over 306 when the national tournament was held in Daytona Beach, Florida in 2013.
Kim, after starting with a bogey, went back to par after the next four holes. She parred the next three holes to erase a bogey on No. 6 and finish the front nine at 2-over.
A birdie, her seventh in the tournament, at the par-four 10th plus five straight pars kept Kim at 1-over entering the last three holes.
She bogeyed No. 16 but parred the last two to keep her 2-over 74 score. She had a total of three bogeys, her fewest in any of the four rounds in the tournament while her 14 pars was the most.
Kim’s 12th place finish capped a memorable NCAA season where she won five of the nine tournaments in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference. She was in the Top 10 in the four other RMAC events to earn her third RMAC Golfer of the Year award.
She also holds the national best scoring average of 72.47 per round entering the Division II national championship and she ranks 24th overall among all collegiate golfers in the NCAA Division I, II, II, NAIA, and NJCAA.
Midwestern State’s Breanna Moore topped the individual tournament with a 9-over-297 while the University of Indianapolis claimed the team championship following a 60-over 1,212.
