PEORIA, Ill. -- The Bradley women's golf team was picked third in the Missouri Valley Conference Women's Golf pre-championship poll heading into next week's Valley Championship which will be held Sunday, Monday and Tuesday at the Club at Porto Cima in Lake of the Ozarks, Mo.
The Braves received 78 points in a vote of the 10 league coaches to finish behind defending-champion and tournament-host Missouri State (94 points) and Illinois State (92 points). Bradley finished eight shots out of the lead in fifth at last year's championship in Terre Haute, Ind., marking the first time in league history four other schools finished within eight shots of the champion.
Play at the par-72 Porto Cima Golf Course in Lake of the Ozarks, Mo., will start with 9 a.m. tee times each day and feature one round of play. BradleyBraves.com will provide a link to live scoring for all three days.
Freshman Danielle Lemek (Doniphan, Neb./Doniphan-Trumbull) enters the Valley Championship with a league-best 75.0 season stroke average in her quest to break the Bradley season stroke average record. Lemek, who tied the Bradley season record for rounds in the 70's with her 27th sub-80 round of the year Sunday at the Indiana Invitational, needs to shoot a 248 (82.67 per round) to break Breanne Neufeld's school season stroke average mark of 75.76 set in 2010-11.
Lemek has a chance to join sophomore Thea Hedemann (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan/Walter Murray) as one of five individuals in program history to earn All-Missouri Valley Conference honors as a freshman. The 2011-12 MVC Newcomer of the Year, Hedemann looks to repeat last year's performance at the conference championship where she tied for fifth to lead the Braves. She enters the tournament second on the squad and ninth in the MVC with a 78.5 stroke average this year.
Freshman Jenna Roadley (Winnipeg, Manitoba/Sturgeon Heights) has been Bradley's second highest finisher in each of the last two tournaments and has posted a 79.4 stroke average over her last seven rounds.
Sophomore Christie Lin (Calgary, Alberta/Sir John G Diefenbaker) finished ninth at last year's Valley Championship and needs two sub-80 rounds to become the 10th player in school history to card 40 or more career rounds in the 70's. Lin owns a 79.3 stroke average over her last 13 rounds and a 78.8 average after missing the Johnie Imes Invitational mid-way through the fall schedule.
Freshman Allison Walsh (Mt. Prospect, Ill./Mt. Prospect) has posted an 80.4 stroke average this spring and carded six of her 10 rounds in the 70's this season during the spring semester.
