Kaleiya Romero of Pepperdine claimed the individual title and led the Waves to a league-best 20th West Coast Conference Women’s Golf Championship on the Olympic Course at Gold Mountain in Bremerton, Wash.
Pepperdine has claimed 20 of the 26 WCC Women’s Championships contested, including two of the last three.
“It has been a great season and the players have played very well to win five tournaments,” said Coach Laurie Gibbs, who is in her 30th season leading the Waves. “We are very excited to finish four tournaments in the last five weeks with a WCC Championship.”
The Waves posted a score of 290-283-279—852, nine-under-par, to win by a whopping 17 strokes over Brigham Young, which finished at 293-296-290—869, while Gonzaga was third at 294-296-286—876.
San Francisco was fourth at 296-294-293—883, followed by Santa Clara in fifth at 297-289-303—889.
Romero, a junior from San Jose who also captured the 2022 Dick McGuire Invitational, claimed her second college victory with a score of 70-72-67—209 to lead the Waves to a sweep of the first three spots in the individual standings.
Lion Higo, a junior from Australia who also has two victories this season, finished second at 73-64-73—210, followed by Reese Guzman, a senior from Hawaii, who wound up at 72-73-68—213.
Rianna Mission of San Francisco was fourth at 69-74-72—215, followed by Grace Lee of Gonzaga at 73-73-71—217, while Adeline Anderson of Brigham Young shot 74-75-69—218 to tie for sixth with Cassie Kim of Gonzaga, who finished at 74-74-70—218, and Yvonne Shang of San Francisco totaled 71-75-73—219 to tie for eighth with Lila Galeai of Brigham Young, who wound up at 71-72-76—219.
Rachel Wang of Santa Clara shot 73-72-75—220 to tie for 10th with Chaewon Baek of Gonzaga, who finished at 75-73-72—220, Kerstin Fotu of Brigham Young, who totaled 75-72-73—220, Allysha Mae Mateo of Brigham Young, who wound up at 69-77-74—220, and Annick Haczkiewicz, who came in at 69-77-74—220.
Rounding out the scoring for team champion Pepperdine were Lauren Gomez in solo 16th at 78-74-71—223, and Yingzhi Shu in solo 23rd at 75-79-76—230.
The Waves, whose five tournament victories in one season have tied a program record, will play next in the NCAA Women’s Regional Championships, with the selections and pairings for those critical matches to be announced on Wednesday.
Pepperdine has never won the NCAA Championship, losing to USC in the 2003 national finals.
For complete results, visit: https://results.golfstat.com//public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=participants&tid=27243
