College golfers from across the West Coast converged on Sacramento and the Alister MacKenzie Golf Course at Haggin Oaks this weekend to compete in the Sacramento Invitational Golf Tournament- and California State University Sacramento’s own Tess Blair won with a -6 score of 138 over the two day event to bring home the win.
With the college seasons on hiatus, this special event was created to give women collegiate athletes an opportunity to compete with their peers on a world-class public golf course. Players represented universities like UC Davis, Fresno State, Sac State, Cal Poly, UC Irvine, William Jessup, Boise State, Stanford and more. The crisp fall mornings and breezy conditions gave the girls a challenge in otherwise perfect golfing weather over the two-day event and the young ladies showed off their incredible golfing prowess with some solid scoring over the illustrious track.
Blair, the Big Sky Player of the Year and Freshman of the Year is clearly keeping her game sharp despite the Big Sky Conference postponing all fall competitions to the spring of 2021. After recently winning the 2020 California State Fair Golf Championship at Bartley Cavanaugh in September, she can add this new title and trophy to her mantle. She got off to a tough start to the event, double bogeying the #4 par 5 on her first day, but played stellar golf the entire rest of the way, making only two additional bogeys over the two rounds of golf and finishing with a final score of 70-68 to win by two.
The phenomenal victory continues a torrid stretch of golf for the Hornet. In the last year, she has won the Rainbow Wahine Invitational and ended with a third-place showing at The Gunrock Invitational. Her three top-five finishes are tied for the fifth-most in school single-season history, her four top-10 finishes are tied for fourth and her six top-20 finishes are tied for third. She led the team in four of the seven tournaments during the year which places her third in school history for a single season.
Chico-native and UC Davis player Jackie Lucena finished alone in second place with a score of -4 after rounds of 68-72. Lucena was the first-round leader, but ran into trouble in the middle of her second round, bogeying three out of five holes between #7 and #12 on the final day of play.
Former First Tee of Greater Sacramento member, Granite Bay HS graduate, Roseville native and UC Irvine player Sienna Lyford followed up her stellar first round of 69 with an even par 72 in round two and finished alone in third place at -3.
Alone in fourth place at -1 was Lory Paradis who is just starting her Freshman year at Fresno State after a long and illustrious junior career in her native country of Canada, where she grew up in Blainville, Quebec.
Our winner Tess Blair is pictured below along with a leaderboard below it. The Haggin Oaks and Morton Golf team congratulate all of the participants and especially our hometown hero, Tess.
