Comforts of Home Have Rams in the Hunt

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – As an athlete, you take comfort in whatever you can find during competition.

On Monday, the Ptarmigan Country Club was the place for Colorado State's women's golf team. The Rams play and practice there a lot. They know where trouble lurks and how to take a shortcut or two, and it helped them finish two rounds at 1-over 577, leaving them four strokes behind leader Nevada.

Only six of the 15 teams in the field were able to finish play before darkness started to set in, and the Rams were one. The rest of the field has one or two holes to finish up before the third and final round of the Colonel Wollenberg Ptarmigan Ram Classic starts Thursday. Those players will take to the course at 9 a.m. to tidy up the final few holes, then they will all regather in the same pairings as today.

Being home can play the other way – it can feel like pressure to perform – if one isn't careful, and the Rams were good about not getting ahead of themselves most of the day.

"There's a little, almost pressure, but I tried to put that to the side. We play here often," junior Gabby Minier said. "I really wanted to play here and play well here and show everybody I'm good at golf and I can beat anyone out here.

"It gives me more comfort knowing I've played here plenty of times and I've shot great scores here. I just need to play that way and stay comfortable with where I'm at. I know if I hit a bad shot, I can come out of it."

Which she did. She sits in fourth as an individual after shooting a 1-under 71 the first round, even par in the second. She is four strokes off the pace set by Nevada's Anitra Khoth (5-under 139), who has teammate Victoria Gailey one stroke back.

Minier made the second turn at 1-over, but birdied two of her final three holes to get back to even for the round.

She is one stroke ahead of teammate Lacey Uchida, as the freshman put together back-to-back rounds of 72 to sit at even. For her, the biggest adaptation she's had to make to college is keeping everything in balance.

"In college golf, it's a lot about course management. Every shot counts for the team," she said. "If you make a bogey, it's fine, somebody can make a birdie, but you have to make sure every shot counts, because you're not on your own any more. If you take a double, the team takes a double. You have to be consistent and always on your game. You've got to grind through those 36 holes, but it's also nice to know your teammates are behind you, too."

Even your coach. On 16 in the final round of the day, she left herself with an uphill lie just off of the green. Her initial thought was to putt the ball, but coach Laura Cilek talked her out of it.

Good thing, too, because chipped in for her only birdie on the back nine.

"Actually, I was nervous about that one," she said. "I wanted to putt it, but coach was like, chip it and just trust it. So, mid-swing I was, 'OK, just hit it,' and luckily it worked out."

The Rams have two others in the top 10, with Andrea Bergsdottir and Panchalika Arphamongkol (playing unattached) tied at 1-over 145. Sofia Torres is tied for 11^th at 2-over 146, Pemika Arphamongkol is 8-over (152) and Thea Bjerkelo is at 11-over 155, also playing unattached. Torres has the biggest improvement for the team from the first to second round, coming back at 1-under, the other sub-par round for the team on the day.

Head coach Laura Cilek celebrated her birthday by watching her team do exactly what it needed at its home show.

"I thought we had a really good game plan coming into today," she said. "When you're playing on your home golf course, you can get a little bit ahead of yourself, because you know you can play well and make a lot of birdies. But you still have to play golf shot by shot, so that was our thought process coming in here – take advantage of the holes where you can and be patient on the harder ones, and they did a great job with that today.

"We did ebb and flow a little bit, up and down, but they kept their heads down and tried to birdie the next one. We have a good chance to come out and win this golf tournament for the first time in a long time."

The hope for Cilek is being in contention should be a confidence boost for the team, as long as they keep it all in perspective.

The same game plan will work, but not if they have wandering eyes. Their shots are theirs alone, the same as they are for every other team in the field. She will remind them that week to week, the teams may change, but the opponent never will.

Not even when it's your home course.

"You're still playing the golf course. You can't control what the other teams are doing," she said. "All you can do is control what you're doing, so you come out with the same game plan. You've played the course four days in a row, so go out, trust yourselves and have fun, then add them up at the end."

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