By John M. Sherrard
(IRVINE) The Mt. SAC Women's Golf team rebounded Wednesday and had its best day of the season in the Orange Empire Conference with a perfect 4-0 record at the Oak Creek Golf Club in Irvine Wednesday afternoon.
With the win the Mounties moved into third place, just one place out of a So Cal Regional invite next month. The OEC sends its top two teams to the Regionals, with a chance to advance to the CCCAA State Championships in November.
In addition, next Monday Mt. SAC will host match number five of six in conference play. The match will be held at Royal Vista Golf Course in Walnut. Golfers will tee off at 11:00 a.m.
Mt. SAC is hoping to finish in first or second in the last two matches for the chance to move on in the Regionals.
Finishing second on the day was Irvine Valley College with a 3-1 record, followed by Saddleback College (2-2), Orange Coast College (1-3) and Fullerton (0-4).
Saddleback remains in first with two conference events remaining with a 13-3 record, followed by IVC (12-4), Mt. SAC (8-8), OCC (6-10) and Fullerton (1-15).
The key stat of the day was four of the six Mt. SAC student/athletes finished with scores in the 80's. None of the other four teams accomplished that.
"That was a big win for us (Wednesday)," said Mt. SAC Golf coach Greg Osbourne, who is a PGA member. "It (winning) was a necessity. We had to win or we were done."
The Mounties have done it before, winning eight straight last season to win the conference championship.
"A week ago we were struggling and (Wednesday) everything came together," said Osbourne, who is in his second year as the Mounties coach. "The attitude was so fantastic."
A big strength of this years' team has been its chipping and Osbourne praises the schools chipping green. It's the only one of its kind in the conference.
The star of the day for the Mounties was freshman Janet Romero with a team-low score of 83, which was good for a tie for fourth overall on the very difficult par 71 course.
Finishing with scores of 86, good for a tie for sixth overall, were Mt. SAC teammates Danielle Nhem and sophomore Tiffany Lin. Freshman Kendall Montero shot an 87, which was a great score for her.
"Tiffany shot an 86 (Wednesday) and played well and kept it together," said Osbourne of the only returning sophomore and team captain on the team.
"She (Romero) actually played (Wednesday) like I thought all year," Osbourne said. "She came back and played great on a tough course. She recovered very well and that's what I'm proud of her for and she proved she can play in this league."
Freshman Brianna Pulido, who has the lowest scoring average this year on the team, played No. 4 and scored a 98, was "ecstatic that the team won."
Matea Castreje is one of six freshmen on the team and is also president of the Student-Athlete Advisory Council at Mt. SAC.
The seventh member of this years' team is injured payer Allie Montero and twin sister of Kendall. Montero, who hurt her wrist early in the season and played in only two tournaments, has been going to every practice since then and has been very supportive of the team.
Osbourne also praises his assistant coach and former player Sarah Juelch, for her valued help this season. "She is doing a great job this year, helping the team," said Osbourne, of the former first team All-Conference and All-So Cal player. Juelch finished 13th in the state last year.
"We have the nicest group of girls, coming together at the right time," added Osbourne.