BIG10 Womens Golf Championship - NIT Invite

The 3 day, 54 Hole championship is being played at the Par 70, 6,032 yard Oakmont CC in Glendale, CA. The course normally plays to a Par 71 but a short Par 5 has been made a long Par 4. Rutgers comes in after their 3 tourney streak of First or Second Place finishes came to an end last weekend at Ohio State.

Rutgers best finish since joining the B1G was 10th last season. As far as I can tell Leigha Devine '24 has had the best finish, a 5th Place in 2023.

B1G National Rankings (285 D1 Programs)

#2 USC
#6 Oregon
#14 UCLA
#30 Northwestern (2025 National Champion)
#32 Ohio St
#40 Michigan St
#45 Purdue
#46 Indiana
#49 Illinois
#56 Michigan
#67 Maryland
#73 Minnesota
#75 Penn St
#76 Nebraska
#80 RUTGERS
#85 Iowa
#88 Washington
#89 Wisconsin

Any team ranked 45th or better should make the NCAA Regionals. Golf "bracketology" has the B1G top 9 making it

The Duck's Kiara Romero is the #1 ranked Women Amateur in the World by the WAGR. USC's Catherine Park is the #`10 ranked women's college golfer, followed by teammates #13 Bailey Shoemaker and #15 Kylie Chong.

This tourney is the regular 5 players, best 4 scores count but with a twist. You designate a 6th, a substitute, ahead of Round 1. The substitute can take the place of a teammate for the 2nd and/or 3rd Round. If in the 2nd, the starter may return for the 3rd Round but only in place of the substitute.

Lineup and pairings have not been announced.

BIG 10 Women's Championships - Oakmont Country Club

As posted above, the Knights lineup will be....

1. Jr Emily James - Bury, England
2. So Judy Amano - Tokyo, Japan
3. Fr Elizabeth Ryu- Dublin, OH
4.So Joline Truong - Ontario, Canada
5. RSJr Grace Lu - Edison, NJ

Sub

Jr Krystal Li - Ontario, Canada

The team is paired with Penn St and Nebraska starting off on #10.

The ranking were updated a 2nd time this week. Rutgers (79) moved up 1 spot as did Iowa. Illinois and Washington dropped 1 spot while Wisconsin dropped 2. Against all competition in the '25-'26 season, Rutgers Women are 83-47-3.

In today's not very good first round, the Women shot 28 Over. They stand 16th, 1 stroke behind Minnesota in 15th. Grace Lu, Elizabeth Ryu, and Judy Amano all shot 6 Over standing T55. Joline Truong shot 80 and Emily James an 82.

Rutgers was last in Par 3 scoring, 15th in Par 4 scoring, and a 4way T10th in Par 5 scoring. They were 5th in fewest Bogeys (20) but 2nd in Most Double Bogeys or greater (11).

Top 5 Teams

1. #6 USC.......................-3
T2. #50 Illinois.............+2
T2. #32 Ohio St
T4. #45 Purdue............+4
T4. #75 Penn St

Individually Illinois Anna Ritter's 5 Under gave her a 2 stroke lead over Purdue's Luana Valero and 3 strokes over 3 tied for 3rd.

There will be no lineup changes tomorrow when RU is again paired with Nebraska along with Wisconsin, teeing off on 20.

richthedentist said:

Not a good day

Click to expand...

In part, it goes to show the level of competition in the B1G. A pretty darn good Womens Golf conference became a bear with the addition of USC, Oregon, and UCLA. But that doesn't explain why the teams had so many more Doubles+.

If RU was to finish close to where they are, their ranking would be a 20 or more place improvement over '24-'25 (#102) and better than '23-'24 (#84) when they finished the season winning the NIT.

Can't say it'll happen here but there seems to be a round in many tourneys where teams as a whole go lower. We'll see today.

In today's 2nd Round, Rutgers shot 20 Over, an 8 stroke improvement. Unfortunately, a number also improved. 20 Over was 15th out of 18. ahead of Washington, PSU, and Michigan. At 48 Over the team was able to hold on to 16th, 8 behind Minnesota and Maryland T14 and 2 ahead of Nebraska in 17th.

Frosh Ellie Ryu led the team with a 1 Over score which consisted of 3 Birdies,12 Pars, 2 Bogeys, and 1 Double. She is currently T32nd, Grace Lu shot +5, Joline Truong +6, Emily James +8 and Judy Amano +9. The team cut doubles+ by 7 but in 90 holes they only were able to card 5 Birdies, as I posted 3 alone by Ryu.

Other stats are not available at this time

Top 5 Teams

1. #2 USC.........................-4
T2. #32 Ohio St.............+7
T2. #45 Purdue
T4. #40 Michigan St....+11
T4. #50 Illinois

#6 Oregon (+21) is 7th and #14 UCLA (+24) is 8th.

USC's Bailey Shoemaker shot the round of the day , a 5 Under to take a 1 stroke lead over Purdue's Luana Valero with 3 players tied for 3rd, 4 back.

Rutgers should again be paired with Nebraska and Wisconsin tomorrow.

In today's final round, the Women shot their 2nd 20 Over in a row and finished 16th for the Championship only ahead of Nebraska and Wisconsin. In the 11 B1G C'ships Rutgers have competed this is the 9th time they've finished in the bottom 3. The only exceptions were 11th in 2023 and 10th in 2025.

Joline Truong led the Knights with a 3 Over. She was followed by Emily James +4. Grace Lu +6, Ellie Ryu +7, and Judy Amano +11. Krystal Li was never used as a substitute. Once again almost 10 Doubles+ did them in.

2 Time B1G Freshman of the Week, Ellie Ryu, was the Knights highest finisher at Tied for 42nd and only one to finish in the top half of the field.

Top 5 Teams

1. #2 USC.......................+4
2. #32 Ohio State.......+16
3. #45 Purdue..............+23
4. #46 Indiana.............+32
T5. #14 UCLA..............+33
T5. #50 Illinois

USC's Jasmine Koo (-3) shot 2 Under making up a 4 stroke deficit to pass teammate Bailey Shoemaker, winning the Individual title by 2 strokes over her and Ohio State's Nellie Ong. They were the only players under par.

The B1G should have 8, maybe 9 teams selected for the NCAA Regionals.

The past 2 years RU has been invited to the Golfweek NIT, played at Southern Dunes in Maricopa, Arizona. They won the tourney in '24 and finished 7th in '25. No idea if they'll be invited again or if they'd accept. Should know soon.

If not that's the end of season.

The NCAA Womens Championship field was announced Wednesday.

9 B1G teams made the field of 72. The SEC has 13, B12 11 and ACC 10.

5 teams from each regional will advance to the Medal Play title with the top 8 advancing to the Match Play Final at La Costa in Carlsbad, CA

Illinois is the 8 Seed in the Stanford Regional

Oregon is the 2 Seed in the Waco Regional

UCLA is the 3 Seed and Purdue the 7 in the Tallahassee Regional

Michigan State is the 7 Seed in the Chapel Hill Regional

Indiana is the 8 Seed in the Louisville Regional

USC is the 1 Seed, Ohio State the 4 and defending National Champ, Northwestern, the 5 in the Ann Arbor Regional.

Stanford will be going for their 3rd title in 5 years.

I've been waiting to see if they'd go. Thanks for the heads up.

#80 is indeed the highest ranking in the past 3 years. The team was #85 in '23-'24 and #102 in '24-'25. Golfstat was the ranking system prior to that but can't find anything from that time.

RU Women were also invited to play in the 1st Tournament in '23 but declined. Penn State replaced them and won. RU won it in '24 and finished 7th last year. The field was 10 teams in the prior years but according to this artricle, the field could have been up to 18 this year.

Ohio State won the Men's Championship last year.

National Golf Invitational 2026: Winner to receive PGA Tour exemption