Big 10 Match Play has long been an early-spring staple for men’s golf teams in the conference, but as a women’s version debuted this year at Innisbrook Resort in Palm Harbor, Florida, Northwestern logged three head-to-head victories to take the inaugural title.
The Wildcats’ three match-play wins came against Penn State in the quarterfinals, Ohio State in the semifinals and Purdue in the title match. The format pitted six players from each team against each other in each round, and Northwestern won the final match by a 4-2-0 margin with Kelly Sim, Jennifer Cai, Jieni Li and Lauryn Nguyen all picking up a point.
Senior Kelly Sim was the only Wildcat to go undefeated for the week. This is the first title this season for Northwestern, ranked 49th by Golfweek.
Golfweek/Sagarin Rankings: Women’s team | Women’s individual
College golf blog: The Road to Grayhawk