Saluki men's and women's golf season preview
09/13/2013 | 12:00:00 | Women's Golf
Sept. 6, 2012
By John Lock
SIUSalukis.com
CARBONDALE, IL - Both the Saluki men's and women's golf teams open their season early next week. The women's team starts the season with a Sunday-Monday tournament in Bloomington, Ill.--the Redbird Classic. The men's team will play 36 holes on Monday and another 18 on Tuesday at the Wasioto Winds Fall Kick-Off. Before the seasons tee off, here's a preview of what to look for from the teams.
Men
The men's team had numerous highlights during the 2011-12 season, but the year ended with a disappointing eighth-place finish at the Missouri Valley Conference Championships. Southern was picked fifth in the pre-Championships poll and was in the top-three in the MVC in scoring average throughout most of the year. However, the team's top golfer, Jake Erickson, came down with the flu and the team didn't play well for the last 54 holes of the season.
The team started last year by firing a team score of one under par at the Wasioto Winds Fall Kick-Off-- the lowest team score in nearly five years. The team proceeded to win the Skyhawk Fall Classic and Erickson won the individual title--the first time the SIU men swept the team and individual titles at a tournament since 2003.
Jake Erickson
The top five golfers, in terms of scoring average, return from last year's squad, led by Erickson. The Springfield native posted a 74.1 scoring average last year as a junior--the seventh-best single-season average in school history. He won the Springfield city tournament over the summer and placed in the top-20 in the Illinois State Amateur.
Erickson wasn't the only Saluki golfer to play well at the Illinois State Amateur. Jeffrey Miller and incoming freshman Drew Novara finished ahead of Erickson at the event. Miller finished fifth overall and Novara tied for ninth. Also returning is Brandon Cauldwell, who led SIU in four of its five fall tournaments last year.
Women
The women's team is coming off one of the most successful seasons in school history. Head coach Alexis Mihelich guided the team to four tournament wins in her first year as the head coach and saw her golfers take five individual titles out of 11 tournament appearances. Those four team wins were the most in a single season since records have been kept.
After starting the season with a second-place finish at the Redbird Classic--the same tournament SIU opens with this year--the Salukis posted back-to-back wins. They won back-to-back tournaments in the spring, too, including the Saluki Invitational crown. SIU hosts two spring tournaments this year. The Dawgs host the Saluki Invitational in late March and then host Dalhousie's Dawgs three weeks later.
Only one individual champion returns from last year's squad, but Cassie Rushing, who won the Saluki Invitational at Hickory Ridge, led the team in scoring average last year by nearly a stroke and a half. She earned All-Conference honors and placed in the top-five individuals at all five spring tournaments.
Both teams added official Twitter accounts in the offseason. Follow them @SIU_MGolf and @SIU_WGolf.
Players Mentioned
