SAC Championship on deck for No. 24 C-N
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Nearly three weeks after closing the regular season with a second-place showing at the Louise Suggs Invitational, No. 24 Carson-Newman turns its attention to the South Atlantic Conference Championship that starts on Sunday at the Woodlake Golf Club in nearby Tazewell, Tenn.
VIDEO: Suzanne Strudwick Interview
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – Nearly three weeks after closing the regular season with a second-place showing at the Louise Suggs Invitational, No. 24 Carson-Newman turns its attention to the South Atlantic Conference Championship that starts on Sunday at the Woodlake Golf Club in nearby Tazewell, Tenn.
C-N grabbed three top-five finishes throughout the season, two of those being in the top three. It won the Battle at Hilton Head to open the campaign in late February. As a whole, the group's four-person team averaged a 313.9 round through 13 rounds of play. The lowest single-round score came in the second round of the Louise Suggs Invitational with a 304.
"I feel like we did, obviously, really well winning the first tournament of this season which was fantastic," Carson-Newman coach Suzanne Strudwick said. "So you start with a bang and expect to stay at that level which, you know, obviously, the competition got a little tougher as we played. We've done well; we've adjusted to a couple of different lineups. We've incorporated seven players all together which has good. The lineup that we have, I feel as though that's the lineup we can be most successful with."
Ellie Haughton (Lincolnshire, England) and Maeve Cummins (Waringstown, Northern Ireland) are the only two Eagles to have played in all 11 rounds for the group this season and hold the top two scoring averages. Haughton, who picked up the first All-SAC honor of her career this past week, will play at the No. 1 spot for a second-straight event, the third of the season. Through four events, she has landed in the top 20 in three of those including a tie for second at the Louise Suggs Invitational to close out the regular season. She leads the team with a 77.5 scoring average.
For the first time in her career, @elliehaughton is an All-@SAC_Athletics selection, landing on the honorable mention list.
— Carson-Newman Athletics (@CNathletics) April 9, 2021
��: https://t.co/Ib4nAMeIFt pic.twitter.com/aDR07pXTDh
Cummins, the No. 2 seed for this event, checks in with a 77.6 scoring clip. She makes her return to the SAC Championship field as the reigning top medalist since the 2020 event was cancelled due to the COVID19 pandemic. She won the event days after being named the 2019 SAC Freshman of the Year with a 3-over 219, the third-lowest score in event history. She's the only Eagle making a return to the Championship field. Much like Haughton, she has grabbed a trio of top-20 showings with two in the top 10. Her best finish was a third-place showing at the Battle at Hilton Head to open the season, pushing C-N to a team win at the event. The junior holds the best single-round score for the Orange and Blue on the year, firing a 73 in the second round of the Louise Suggs Invitational.
On the career side, Cummins is still the leader for the Orange and Blue by a large margin, scoring a 76.0 clip in 53 rounds. The next closest is Haughton with a 77.6 in 21 rounds.
✅ Freshman of the Year
— Carson-Newman Athletics (@CNathletics) April 9, 2019
✅ Top Medalist at the tournament@SAC_Athletics, say hello to @Maeve_Cummins1 ����
The freshman's performance helped No. 24/25 #CNWG place fourth at the SAC Championship today.
��: https://t.co/YLBp0qnyyV pic.twitter.com/Qh9TkUwYWN
The rest of the lineup follows suit in mirroring that from the regular-season finale with Matilda Frövenholt (Öjersjö, Sweden) as the three-seed. The lone senior for Strudwick's group this week currently has the second-lowest season average of her career with a 78.5 clip. She has landed in the top 20 of both events she has played in with her best showing coming at the Low Tide Intercollegiate where she tied for 12th at 13-over.
Hannah Holland (Sale Creek, Tenn.) and Alice Thomas (Mid Glamorgan, Wales) round out the starting lineup as the No. 4 and No. 5, respectively. Holland is averaging a 78.9 round in eight rounds this season while Thomas is at an 80.7 clip through nine rounds.
After last year's championship was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Lincoln Memorial will get a second shot at hosting the event at its home course in Tazewell. The last time C-N appeared at the course was for the State Farm Intercollegiate in September 2019. The Eagles landed in third at the event with Cummins tying for second.
Carson-Newman has finished in the top five at the event 10 times since its inception in 2009, winning three times. The last SAC Championship title came in 2015. Three Eagles have finished as the top medalist at the event. Sarah Jane Sinard won it in 2009 when C-N made its debut as the tournament champions. Elizabeth England was the victor in 2017 before Cummins won as a freshman in 2019.
This year's field boasts four nationally-ranked squads, three of those in both the Golfstat and Women's Golf Coaches Association polls. Limestone is the highest-ranked, sitting at third in both followed by No. 7/6 Anderson and No. 20/19 Wingate. Carson-Newman fell out of the top 25 of the most recent WGCA poll but is still receiving votes.
The 54-hole championship tournament opens on Monday from the Woodlake Golf Club with two rounds of action beginning at 8:30 a.m. with a shotgun start followed by a final round on Tuesday. Live scoring can be found here via BirdieFire throughout each round.
