No. 25 Red Raiders open spring slate in Florida

Sunday, February 13

Melbourne, FL

Texas Tech Athletics

Columbia Classic

No. 25 Red Raiders open spring slate in Florida

February 12, 2022 | Women's Golf

Tee Times Live Scoring

Texas Tech tees off the two-day Columbia Classic Sunday morning at the Duran Golf Club, outside of Orlando

By: Matt Dowdy

LUBBOCK, Texas – The No. 25 Texas Tech women's golf team will open its spring slate Sunday morning when the Red Raiders tee off at the Columbia Classic hosted at the Duran Golf Club just outside of Orlando, Florida.

The two-day, 54-hole event is the first of seven tournaments this spring for the Red Raiders, who took on a challenging fall with three top-five finishes, including a third-place showing at the Blessings Collegiate in October. Tech started its season with a runner-up finish at the Sam Golden Invitational hosted by North Texas.

The Red Raiders will be the second-highest ranked school in the 15-team field, trailing only Big 12 counterpart Oklahoma State, which is at No. 2 in the latest Golfweek Magazine poll. The field also includes several likely NCAA Regional participants in No. 26 Virginia Tech, No. 29 Georgia, No. 32 Illinois, No. 36 Purdue and No. 39 Iowa State as well as a slew of Ivy League schools such as Dartmouth, Yale, Princeton and host Columbia.

Texas Tech will send three freshmen to Florida as part of its lineup as Chiara Horder, Libby Fleming and Chelsea Romas all qualified for the tournament alongside reigning Big 12 individual champion Gala Dumez, a sophomore, and senior veteran Amy Taylor. Junior Cecilie Nielsen will also participate as an individual but will not contribute to the team score.

Taylor led the Red Raiders with a 71.5 stroke average over five events this fall, edging Dumez and her 71.8 clip for the team low. Dumez had a team-leading two top-five finishes, though, finishing tied for fourth at both the Blessings Collegiate and the Jim West Challenge.

Horder and Romas, meanwhile, showed they could both compete at a high level throughout the fall, finishing with a stroke average near par at 72.8 and 73.8, respectively. This will be the collegiate debut for Fleming, a San Diego native who joined the Red Raiders this fall after a stellar high school career in California.

The Red Raiders are slated to open the tournament with a 7:15 a.m. CT shotgun start Sunday morning. Live scoring will be available throughout the tournament at Golfstat.com.

TOURNAMENT INFORMATION
Dates: Feb. 13-14, 2022
Format: Stroke play, 54 holes; 36 holes Sunday, 18 holes Monday
Tee Times: 7:15 a.m. CT Sunday and Monday
Site: Duran Golf Club (Viera, Fla.)
Host School: Columbia
Course par and yardage: Par 72, 6,357 yards
Tournament Field (Golfweek Ranking): Oklahoma State (2), Texas Tech (25), Virginia Tech (26), Georgia (29), Illinois (32), Purdue (36), Iowa State (39), Northwestern (49),Tulsa (55), Boston University (83), Princeton (84), Yale (106), Columbia (116), Dartmouth (136), Albany (15).