Krueger completes Top 10 finish at Austin Peay

Senior Kayla Krueger (Spring Lake, Mich. / Spring Lake) closed out a Top 10 finish as the Valparaiso University women’s golf team put together a Top 5 showing at the F&M Bank Austin Peay State University Intercollegiate hosted at Clarksville Country Club in Clarksville, Tenn. Valpo fended off North Alabama by three stokes on Tuesday to nail down the fifth-place finish.

How It Happened

  • Krueger was again the team leader in Round 3, carding a 78 (+6) on Tuesday. She finished at 230 for the event to tie for 10th in the 51-player field.
  • The team’s second-best Round 3 performance came courtesy of senior Tiffany Curtis (Crown Point, Ind. / Crown Point), who posted a 79 for her second sub-80 round of the tournament. She finished at 243, tied for 26th overall.
  • Sophomore Payton Hodson (Middleton, Wis. / Middleton) edged Curtis in the 54-hole standings at 239 (25th) after golfing an 83 on Tuesday.
  • After accumulating a 321 over the final 18 holes, Valpo finished the two-day event at 948. The Brown & Gold placed ahead of North Alabama (952), Belmont (962), Evansville (969) and Eastern Illinois (1035) in the team standings.
  • IUPUI took the team title with a 900, while Marion Debove of the Jaguars was the individual medalist with a 216.

Inside the Rounds

  • Valpo’s team score of 948 garnered a spot in the program record book as the third-lowest score in program history. Only the 2017 Fort Wayne Classic (941) and the 2016 Golfweek Program Challenge (947) saw Valpo output better marks.
  • The team score in relation to par was +84, which also ranked third in program history. The program record of +77 was set at this season’s Loyola Fall Invitational, while the only other score better than this week was a +81 at the 2014 Horizon League Championship.
  • Krueger’s 230 cracked the individual program leaderboard for 54-hole score. She previously posted a 228 at the Loyola Fall Invitational, which is tied for third. Her 54-hole score at Austin Peay is tied for seventh in program history.
  • Krueger’s 54-hole score in relation to par of 14 strokes over allowed her to crack the all-time Top 10 for the second time this season. She already set the program record with a +9 at the Loyola Fall Invitational, and her score in relation to par from this event ranks fifth in program history.
  • Krueger achieved her second Top 10 finish of the season and the third by a Valpo player. The team has finished in the top six of an event twice this season after placing no better than seventh in any 2018-19 tournament.   
  • The team did its best work on Par 3 holes with the third-best score in the nine-team field at 3.25 (+19). Individually, Curtis and Krueger both averaged 3.07 (+1) on Par 3s.
  • Valpo had 17 birdies as a team with Curtis’s five pacing the squad.

Thoughts from Head Coach Jill McCoy

“Today was a little tougher mentally, but we still played consistent as a team. Kayla and Tiffany finished with good, solid scores. We are looking forward to a week off to improve our chipping, putting and mental toughness.”

Up Next

After the aforementioned week away from tournament play, the team will partake in the Dayton Fall Invitational, which begins on Monday, Oct. 14 at NCR Country Club in Kettering, Ohio.