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Bears Start Pivotal Stretch With Big Match

Sep 27, 2022

The Cal women's golf team commences one of its pivotal stretches of the season Thursday when it joins forces with the Golden Bears' men's team to take on Stanford in the Big Match.

The match play event is back after a two-year, COVID-19-induced hiatus in which six mixed pairs go head-to-head to determine a winner between the rivals. The event will take place at the Menlo Country Club in Woodside.

The women's team will then have a day off before traveling to Fayetteville, Ark., for next week's Blessings Collegiate Invitational for a three-day tournament that will be televised by The Golf Channel.

"This is going to be a really big 10 days for us," Cal head coach Nancy McDaniel said. "They've been doing a good job at practice. We have a good challenge ahead of us."

The Bears are coming off a promising season-opening performance at the USF Intercollegiate earlier this month at The Olympic Club in San Francisco. Cal finished in third place out of 10 teams, and was just one stroke behind then-No. 5 UCLA for second place.

Cal had two individuals place in the top-10 at the USF Intercollegiate and another two in the top-20. Junior Cristina Ochoa finished in third place individually with a career-best score of 6-under par.

"It was a good start," McDaniel said. "Team-building is just as important as some of the shots you are hitting on the course, so it's important to have that right from the start. You just have to keep practicing and manage your energy throughout the season."
 
BIG MATCH PAIRINGS
12 p.m.: Adora Liu and Jeewon Park
12:12 p.m.: Cristina Ochoa and Aaron Du
12:24 p.m.: Jasmine Lew and Daniel Heo
12:36 p.m.: Jieming Yang and Sampson Zheng
12:48 p.m.: Mika Jin and Tony Chen
1 p.m.: Annika Borrelli and Nathan Wang