ATHENS, Ga. — The No. 28-ranked Bulldog women’s golf team is set to join a field of 11 ranked teams at the Windy City Collegiate Classic, hosted by Northwestern University, on Monday. Georgia will open competition with 36 holes of continuous play at the Westmoreland Country Club in Wilmette, Ill., on Monday before competing in the tournament’s final round of 18 holes on Tuesday. The tournament kicks off at 8:30 a.m. EDT on Monday, with Georgia teeing off from hole No. 1 in nine-minute intervals between 10:00-10:36 a.m.
“This week we battled adversity with Hurricane Helene, but we are very proud of the resiliency shown by the team in preparing for this event as best as they could,” said head coach Erika Brennan. “It’s a very tough field, so it’s a great opportunity to see how our games stack up. It will require a good blend of playing aggressive and staying patient, and we are all up for the challenge.”
Georgia is one of 15 teams set to compete in a stacked field in Wilmette, which features 11 ranked teams. Four top-10 squads will tee off at the tournament, including No. 2 USC, No. 4 UCLA, No. 7 Wake Forest, and No. 8 Northwestern. Additionally, No. 11 Oregon, No. 12 South Carolina, No. 14 Arizona State, No. 15 Virginia, No. 16 Duke, and No. 19 Arizona will join the No. 28 Bulldogs as the ranked schools competing at the Westmoreland Country Club. Rounding out the field are Augusta, Illinois, Iowa State, and Purdue.
The Bulldogs arrive at the Windy City Collegiate Classic with two tournaments under their belt. Georgia opened the season with an eighth-place finish at the Cougar Classic, shooting 15-over as a team while sophomores Celine Brovold Sanne and Emma Falcher finished 2-over in a tie for 23rd individually. The Bulldogs most recently competed at the UAB Hoover Invitational, placing fourth out of 14 teams while graduate student Chantal El Chaib (3rd), sophomore Morgan Smith (T-5th), and senior Kate Song (T-9th) individually finished in the top 10.
Falcher, who anchored the Bulldogs in each of the first two tournaments, takes the top spot in the Georgia lineup for the third-straight competition. Smith will occupy the second spot while El Chaib, who competed as an individual in Hoover, will return to the team lineup in the third position in Wilmette. Song, who made her season debut two weeks ago, will compete in the fourth spot while Brovold Sanne rounds out the Georgia lineup for the Windy City Collegiate Classic.
Georgia returns to the Northwestern-hosted tournament for the second-straight season. In the 2023 iteration of the event, the Bulldogs carded a 2-under 285 to finish eighth as a team. Caterina Don led the squad with a 6-under 209 to tie for eighth while Song tied for 27th, finishing 2-under. Song is the lone Bulldog to compete in the Windy City Collegiate Classic previously while the other four Bulldogs will compete in the tournament for the first time.
Georgia will be paired with Augusta and Illinois on Monday with Brovold Sanne set to tee off first for the Bulldogs at 10 a.m. Live scoring will be available at https://gado.gs/c5d.