Wildcats Look to Ride Momentum in Norman

MANHATTAN, Kan. – Coming off a victory in its season-opening event, the Kansas State women's golf team will look to duplicate its quality play at the Schooner Fall Classic, Saturday through Monday, at the par-70, 6,188-yard Belmar Golf Club in Norman, Oklahoma.

In their first event of the season, the Wildcats took home the team title at the Powercat Invitational at Colbert Hills with a 54-hole score of 4-under par 860, finishing 20 shots better than second-place North Texas and producing the sixth-lowest 54-hole score in school history.

Individually, K-State had four of its five members of the scoring lineup finish in the top 10 with senior Carla Bernat leading the way by collecting her sixth collegiate victory at 8-under par 208. Freshman Nanami Nakashima finished in second place at 1-under par 215, and sophomore Alenka Navarro tied for third place at 3-over par 219.

"We are excited for our second tournament of the season after a good week of practice and qualifying," head coach Stew Burke said. "We will face a strong field in Norman, which includes some of the best teams and players in the nation and will allow our ladies to test themselves against the very best. Our job as coaches remains the same, which is to put a great plan in place and help the players execute throughout the tournament. The hard work has been done at home, and we're incredibly proud of the culture that this group has built in the short time together."

Kansas State is part of a difficult 16-team field that features nine programs that advanced to postseason play a year ago, including two that were ranked in the Preseason WGCA Poll in Auburn (No. 6) and Florida State (No. 14). The rest of the field includes Florida Atlantic, Iowa State, Houston, North Texas, host school Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Oral Roberts, TCU, Texas State, Tulane, Tulsa, Virginia Tech and Wisconsin.

The Wildcats will utilize the same scoring lineup as the season opener with Bernat, Nakashima and Navarro being joined by senior transfer Sophie Bert and junior Noa van Beek.

With her victory at Colbert Hills, Bernat now has three victories as a Wildcat to place third in school history, while her seven top-five finishes are tied for fifth place. Nakashima was the first Wildcat to place first or second in a season-opening event since at least 1991, while she was the first to place in the top five since Connie Jaffrey finished fourth in her debut in 2014.

Bert, a transfer from East Tennessee State, tied for seventh place at the Powercat Invitational at 5-over par 221, while van Beek tied for 20th at 9-over par 225.

This is the fifth time the Wildcats have competed in the Schooner Fall Classic with their best showing coming in 2015 when they tied for seventh place with a rained-shortened 36-hole score of 581.

Kansas State will begin the first round of the Schooner Fall Classic with tee times off No. 1 starting at 9:20 a.m., as the Wildcats are paired with Oklahoma State and Texas State. Tee times will start play on Sunday beginning at 8:30 a.m., while Monday's tee times begin at 9 a.m. Live results can be viewed on Scoreboard Powered by Clippd.

– k-statesports.com –

How to follow the Cats: For complete information on K-State Women's Golf, visit www.kstatesports.com and follow the team's social media channels on X (formerly Twitter), Instagram and Facebook.

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Players Mentioned

Carla Bernat

Sophie Bert

Nanami Nakashima

Alenka Navarro

Noa van Beek

Kansas State University Athletics