If you blinked, you probably missed the blazing start to the women’s college golf season.
It seems as if the 2024-25 college golf campaign started yesterday, but alas, the end of the fall season is here, and it’s time for a nearly three-month hiatus before the sport picks back up full steam in February, as teams ramp up for a postseason push to Omni La Costa in Carlsbad, California.
There were notable records tied and broken this fall, newcomers making their mark on the sport and some things change while some stay the same.
Here are some of the biggest stories from women’s college golf this fall.
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Jasmine Koo off to dominant start
Only one golfer in the storied history of USC has accomplished what freshman Jasmine Koo did in her first semester on campus.
Koo won three straight events to end the fall season, becoming only the second Trojan ever to accomplish the feat, joining Annie Park in 2013, who won the Pac-12 Championship, the NCAA Regional and NCAA Championship.
Koo’s first title came at the Windy City Collegiate. Then she topped teammate Catherine Park at the Stanford Intercollegiate before claiming her third straight win at the East Lake Cup.
All of this is coming off the heels of a stellar summer for Koo, which saw her advance to the semifinals of the U.S. Girls’ Junior in California and then go 2-1-1 in the Curtis Cup. She’s ranked second in the World Amateur Golf Ranking, and she’s No. 1 in the NCAA golf rankings after the fall season, helping the Trojans win three times in four events, as well.
USC is fourth in the rankings with Koo, Park (No. 10) and sophomore Bailey Shoemaker (No. 47) leading the way.
Stanford remains team to beat
In the last 18 months, Stanford has lost Rose Zhang, Rachel Heck and Sadie Englemann. But don’t blink, the Cardinal remain the team to beat.
Last season, Stanford won its final three tournaments, claiming its third national championship. To begin this season, the Cardinal have done the same, winning three straight tournaments and winning three events of match play at the NB3 Match Play at Twin Warriors.
The six straight wins is the longest in program history. Stanford’s previous longest winning streak was five, which it did around its 2022 national championship and into the start of the 2022-23 season. It is also the longest active streak in the country.
Last week, Stanford capped its fall with a win at the Nanea Invitational in Hawaii, where Megha Ganne earned the second win of her college career.
The strength of this Stanford team is its depth. The Cardinal have six players in the top 76 of the NCAA golf rankings, four of those being freshmen. One of them, Meja Ortengren, leads the way at No. 13 while sophomore standout Paula Martin Sampedro is No. 18. Freshmen Leigh Chen (No. 30) and Nora Sundberg (No. 40) are also in the top 50.
Ganne wasn’t even ranked in the latest update, though that will change Wednesday when new rankings drop.
Depth is a good problem to have for Stanford coach Anne Walker, who will head into the spring looking to build on a record win streak while chasing title No. 4.
Aside from Stanford, Arkansas had won three of its four tournaments and is ranked second. South Carolina, USC and Texas round out the top five.
How about the top players?
If the Annika Award were given away today, Koo would be a runaway winner. However, that doesn’t mean there haven’t been other standouts during the fall.
Arkansas sophomore Maria Jose Marin picked up right where she left off last year, winning the Blessings Collegiate for the second straight year. She also has three top-10 finishes in four stroke-play starts.
Wake Forest senior Carolina Chacarra won the Jackson T. Stephens Cup and has four top-4 finishes in five stroke-play starts. Mississippi State’s Julia Lopez Ramirez has made only three starts this fall but has a runner-up and third-place finish.
Top-ranked amateur Lottie Woad won her first event of the year and fourth of her career last week at the Landfall Tradition, but Florida State teammate Mirabel Ting has won both of her stroke-play starts this year.
Reagan Zibilski and Kendall Todd have also been standouts for Arkansas. But individually, the fall has belonged to Koo.
A record-tying 61
Another player who has two wins this fall is Mississippi State’s Avery Weed, and one of them came in record-setting fashion.
At the Bulldogs’ home tournament, The Ally, Weed shot an opening round 11-under 61 at Old Waverly, tying the record for lowest round in relation to par in NCAA history.
She did it with 10 pars on the card. The five birdies and three eagles, however, are what etched her name in history, giving her the lowest round in Mississippi State history by two shots and tying the low NCAA round in relation to par. She played Old Waverly’s four par 5s in 7 under.
Rest in Peace to a legend
Nancy McDaniel, the longtime women’s golf coach at Cal, died in October from cancer. She was 57. Her former player and current Stanford women’s golf coach Anne Walker confirmed her death.
A Portland, Oregon, native and former star golfer at Washington, McDaniel retired from her position at Cal earlier this year after 29 seasons as the founding head coach of the women’s golf program. Since answering an ad she read in a golf magazine to be the first women’s golf coach at Cal, McDaniel helped turn the team, which debuted in 1995-96, into one of the most nationally regarded programs. Under her leadership, Cal has consistently been ranked in the top 25 nationally as she led the Golden Bears to 10 NCAA Championship appearances, 22 NCAA regional appearances, the 2003 Pac-10 Championship and the 2012 Pac-12 Championship.
“We have a saying at Cal that team stands for Together Everyone Achieves More,” McDaniel routinely would say.
To read more about the coaching legend, click here.
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Here are 5 of the biggest stories from women’s college golf this fall, including a standout debut
