Carleton first-year Carter Sichol leads all MIAC women's golfers with an average score of 73.6 this season.

Women's Golf 9/29/2022 2:00:00 PM

2022 MIAC Women's Golf Championship Preview

COON RAPIDS, Minn. – The first Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) championships of the 2022-23 academic year are set to tee off this weekend, as men's and women's golfers from the MIAC return to Bunker Hills Golf Club in Coon Rapids, Minn. for the 2022 MIAC Golf Championships.

This is the second consecutive season that Bunker Hills has hosted the MIAC Golf Championships. The venue previously served as the conference championship course for MIAC men's golfers for 20 years from 1997-2017 and for MIAC women's golfers for 11 years from 2006-2017 before renovations shifted the conference tournament to other courses around the State of Minnesota from 2018-21.

This weekend, nine men's teams and ten women's teams from the MIAC will head back to Bunker Hills for the three-day, 54-hole conference championship running from Saturday, October 1 through Monday, October 3. Bethel University and The College of St. Scholastica will serve as hosts.

CHAMPIONSHIP 101
Both men's and women's golfers will play the East then West courses each day. Each program will enter five players in the tournament, with the four best performances each day determining the team score. The team with the lowest score over the course of its respective tournament will receive the MIAC's automatic qualifier to the 2023 NCAA Division III Golf Championships.

Men's golf action will begin Saturday morning with the first wave of golfers set to tee off at 8:00 a.m. Teams are seeded based on their finish in the 2021 MIAC Championships and golfers will tee off in descending order of their place in the lineup (No. 5 to No. 1). The 2021 MIAC Champion Saint John's University Johnnies will tee off alongside Gustavus and Carleton to start the tournament at 8:00 a.m., with teams following in order of 2021 finish every eight minutes after. Concordia, Augsburg, and Bethel are tentatively set to begin teeing off at 8:40 a.m. on Saturday, followed by St. Olaf, Augsburg, and St. Scholastica at 9:20 a.m.

Tee times for MIAC women's teams will begin at 10:16 a.m., with defending champion St. Catherine University joining Gustavus and Bethel in the tee box. The second wave of women's golfers will feature Carleton, Saint Benedict, and St. Scholastica beginning at 10:56 a.m., followed by foursomes of Augsburg, St. Olaf, Macalester, and Concordia golfers at 11:36 a.m.

Barring any changes due to weather or course conditions, tee time slots are expected to remain the same throughout all three days of the tournament with the first wave of men's golfers beginning at 8:00 a.m. and the first wave of women's golfers beginning at 10:16 a.m. each day; however, the specific pairings for Sunday and Monday will be reordered according to the previous day's scores. Tentative tee times and pairings for the entire Men's and Women's tournaments are available online on the championship home page.

FOLLOW THE ACTION
Spectators are welcome to attend the 2022 MIAC Golf Championships at Bunker Hills Golf Club and must follow all local and spectator rules. Fans not in attendance in Coon Rapids can follow all the action via unofficial live scoring and hole-by-hole updates through Golfstat's live scoring system.

The MIAC has a championship home page for the event that will serve as the online home of the tournament. The championship page will include tee times, pairings, and results as they become available, as well as recaps and photos.

ALL-CHAMPIONSHIP RETURNERS
Six former MIAC Women's Golf All-Championship Team honorees will be back on the course this weekend including Bethel's Anna Tollefson (1st 2021, T10th 2020, 5th 2019) and Greta McArthur (T3rd 2021); Saint Benedict's Emily Renner (T3rd 2021, T7th 2020); St. Catherine's Jaycee Rhodes (6th 2021, T4th 2020), Krya Venne (T9th 2021), and Sydney Brandt (10th 2019).

POLL TALK
Three MIAC women's golf teams received votes in the latest Women's Golf Coaches Association (WGCA) Top 25 Poll, released on September 23. St. Catherine came in at No. 18, followed by Carleton at No. 19, and Bethel at No. 20. Gustavus received 13 points in the balloting as well.

AROUND THE MIAC
Augsburg junior Avery Sawchuk (Burnsville, Minn.) posted a 36-hole score that put her among the top five results in school history at the St. Kate's Invitational over the weekend. Her two-round total of 160 (77-83) is tied for the fifth-best 36-hole score, while her 158 shot two weeks is the second-best. She finished in a tie for 19th in the 83-player field.

Bethel sophomore Greta McArthur (Fargo, N.D. | Shanley) notched her third top-three finish of the year with a 148 (+4) at the St. Kate's Invitational. A first-round 75 had her sixth on the individual leaderboard before she climbed up three spots with a 73 on Sunday. McArthur went 1-under on the front nine with a pair of birdies. She was second in par-4 scoring where she went plus-1 for the weekend.

Carleton first-year Carter Sichol (Winnetka, Ill. | New Trier) won the St. Kate's Invitational over the weekend with a 1-over-par score of 145 (74-71). Sichol was tied for third at plus-2 after an up-and-down first round that included a pair of triple bogeys but also featured four birdies and an eagle. She fired a 1-under par 71 in round two to earn the top spot on the leaderboard. After a bogey on the first hole of the round, she notched birdies on No. 5 and No. 11 and parred the remaining 15 holes for a two-shot margin of victory.

Concordia senior Abbey Frauenholtz (New Ulm, Minn.) posted the best two-round score of her collegiate career at the St. Kate's Fall Invite. Frauenholtz carded an 82 on Saturday and then backed that up with an 85 on Sunday. The total of 167 bettered her previous career-low of 170 which she fired in her very first college tournament in 2019.

Gustavus junior Annika Reierson (Delano, Minn.) had a career weekend, finishing in second place on the individual leaderboard with a two-round total of 72-77-149 (+5) at the EverSpring Inn Mustang Invite. Reierson had five birdies in her first round and another three in the second round on Sunday.

Macalester junior Phebe Chen (South Barrington, Ill. | Barrington) placed 10th individually at the St. Kate's Invitational. Chen carded scores of 78 and 76 with a 10-over-par 154.

Saint Benedict sophomore Sami Boerboom (Forest Lake, Minn.) tied for 15th place at the St. Kate's Invite with a 13-over-par 157 (79-78). The finish was her first top-15 result of the year.

St. Catherine senior Sydney Brandt (Brookfield, Wis. | Catholic Memorial) finished second overall at the Wildcats' home invite last weekend after setting a program-low in the first round. Brandt shot a 3-under-par 69 in the opening round, which is a new SCU record and tied for the lowest single-round score by a MIAC women's golfer in the last six seasons. She scored a 78 (+6) in the second round to finish the event 3-over-par.

St. Olaf junior Sydney Monge (Minnetonka, Minn.) tied for 13th at the St. Kate's Invite with a two-day 156 (+12). Monge fired a 2-over-par 74 for the second-best round of her collegiate career to sit in a tie for third after 18 holes. The 74 included an even-par 36 on the back nine with two birdies, two bogeys, and five pars. Monge shot an 82 (+10) on Sunday at Eagle Valley to finish in a tie for 13th.

St. Scholastica sophomore Carissa Oberding (Cottage Grove, Minn. | Park) tied for seventh place as an individual at the St. Kate's Invitational with a 9-over-par score of 153 (78-75). It was her first top 10 finish of the season.

LEAGUE LEADERS

2022-23 MIAC Women's Golf Statistical Leaders
Individual				Team
Name	Rounds	Shots	Average	Team	Rounds	Shots	Average
Carter Sichol, Carleton	8	589	73.6	St. Catherine	8	2452	306.5
Greta McArthur, Bethel	8	597	74.6	Bethel	8	2470	308.8
Kyra Venne, St. Catherine	8	600	75.0	Carleton	8	2477	309.6
Anna Tollefson, Bethel	8	606	75.8	Gustavus	8	2629	328.6
Sydney Brandt, St. Catherine	8	610	76.3	Macalester	8	2643	330.4
Jaycee Rhodes, St. Catherine	8	620	77.5	Saint Benedict	8	2657	332.1
Sarah Zheng, Carleton	8	624	78.0	St. Scholastica	8	2674	334.2
Laura Beltman, Bethel	8	628	78.5	St. Olaf	6	2014	335.7
Bailey Lengfelder, Macalester	8	629	78.6	Concordia	8	2875	359.4
Cynthia Liu, Carleton	8	630	78.8	Augsburg	8	2964	370.5

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