PEORIA, Ill. -- Bradley Women's Golf returns to where the Braves opened the 2021-22 season, with BU making the short trip down I-74 to take part in the Redbird Spring Invitational Friday and Saturday in the final tournament before the Missouri Valley Conference Championship later this month.
The 2021-22 season got underway back in early September at the par-72 Weibring Golf Club with Bradley finishing fifth at the season-opening Redbird Invitational behind top-10 finishes from senior Megan Welch (T9th) and freshman Maria Perakis (T9th).
The Redbird Spring Invitational tees off Friday with a single round, which will feature a 12:30 p.m. shotgun start. The final two rounds of the 54-hole tournament will be played Saturday and begin with an 8:30 a.m. shotgun start.
Bradley is one of seven MVC teams scheduled to play in the Redbird Spring Invite, which also includes Drake, Indiana State, Loyola, Southern Illinois, Valparaiso and tournament-host Illinois State. In-state foes Eastern Illinois, Northern Illinois and Western Illinois round out the field.
Welch and Perakis tied for ninth at the Redbird Invitational in the fall to pace the Braves at five-over 221. Welch's 221 this fall was her lowest 54-hole score of her career to that point, while Perakis' score broke the school mark for lowest 54-hole total by a Bradley freshman.
Perakis leads the team with a 75.79 stroke average this season, which ranks ninth among Bradley season marks. Welch had a streak of 21 consecutive sub-80 rounds (sixth longest in program history) snapped last time out at the Diane Daugherty Invitational and enters the Redbird Spring Invite with the seventh-best career scoring average (78.03) in school history.
Junior Mara Flaherty and senior Sarah Nacos have the most experience at the Weibring Golf Club on the Bradley roster with both playing in two tournaments with the Braves at the course. Flaherty, who owns a 75.00 career average at the Weibring Golf Club, tied for 25th at the Redbird Invitational this fall after she tied for 15th in the event as a freshman in 2019-20. Owning a 77.42 average in 2021-22, Flaherty has lowered her career stroke average to 78.16, which is good for eighth all-time at Bradley.
Nacos has also played in two events at the Weibring Golf Club and enters this week's event with a career-high 13 rounds played this season. Her 78.46 stroke average this season is almost one-and-a-half strokes better than her career average entering the 2021-22 campaign.
Senior Elyse Emerzian carded the low round of her career at the Weibring Golf Club during the Redbird Invite to open the 2019-20 season. She tied for fifth in that tournament at two-over 218 and shot par or better in two of her three career rounds at Weibring.
Bradley will follow up the Redbird Spring Invitational with the 2021-22 MVC Championship, which will be held April 17-19 in Kirkwood, Mo., at Greenbriar Hills Country Club.
