Stackhouse gives Stanford its first NCAA women’s golf title

BRADENTON, Fla. (AP) — Mariah Stackhouse rallied to beat Hayley Davis in 19 holes to give Stanford its first NCAA women’s golf title, 3-2 over Baylor on Wednesday in the match-play final.

Stackhouse, a junior from Riverdale, Georgia, won when Davis’ 3-foot par putt missed to the right on the par-4 10th hole at The Concession Golf Club.

“My heart is hurting right now for Hayley,” Baylor coach Jay Goble said. “She has been the heart and soul of our team and she has singlehandedly elevated our team to this position. My heart is really hurting for her right now. This group is amazing and they are winners and we are going to see we did a lot of great things this year.”

Two holes down after losing the par-4 16th, Stackhouse won the par-5 17th with a two-putt birdie and took the par-4 18th with a 15-foot birdie putt.

“I actually thought a lot about it last night,” Stackhouse said. “It felt kind of silly, but I envisioned some kind of crazy finish with me having to hit huge shots. I knew I was going to be down and I was going to have to do something crazy to come back.”

Davis, a senior from England, birdied the 16th, hitting a 134-yard shot from a muddy lie in the left-side hazard to 8 feet.

“It was tough because the thing was my feet were sinking a little bit, so I was a little bit worried about that,” Davis said. “But then, just the way it went, it was perfect.”

Casey Danielson and Shannon Aubert also won matches for Stanford in the event that switched to the match-play format for the team title this year.

“I think we should keep it,” Stanford coach Anne Walker said about match play.

After Danielson gave Stanford a 2-1 lead with a 2-up victory over Laura Lonardi, Baylor tied it with Dylan Kim’s 3-and-1 victory over Lauren Kim. Stanford took a 1-0 lead when Aubert beat Lauren Whyte 4 and 3, and Baylor pulled even with Giovana Maymon’s 4-and-3 victory over Quirine Eijkenboom.

“I knew Casey was a key match for us right out of the gate,” Walker said. “I thought if we can get Casey’s match then we had a real shot at it. I had a good feeling about Casey. She kept putting herself in a good position.”

The Cardinal beat Arizona and Southern California on Tuesday to reach the final.

“I like it a lot,” Stackhouse said about the new format. “I wasn’t sold on it when it first started just because I always remembered how tired we always are at the end of four days of stroke play. So I was like, ‘Oh, God, when we’re done with that, we got to go play more?'”

On Monday, Alabama’s Emma Talley won the individual title.

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