Once a champion, always a champion. The ASU women's golf team aims to defend its past successes while also seeking new goals.
The Sun Devils secured their eighth NCAA Division I national championship in May. The women are preparing to open the fall season in Franklin, Tennessee at the coveted Mason Rudolph Championship.
This year's team consists almost entirely of returners, even with the departure of then-senior Monica Vaughn, who finished her senior season as the individual NCAA national champion and helped ASU claim its eighth title for the team.
ASU seniors Roberta Liti and Sophia Zeeb also helped contribute to bring home the national championship last season.
“I believe that a big part of winning the national championship was to realize what we were capable of,” Liti said. “Our confidence definitely increased.”
Liti played a significant role last year, winning her first tournament at the Ping/ASU Invitational in the spring.
Zeeb said that the team spirit was strong last year in the NCAA tournament and knows it will carry over into the new season.
“We know what we need to do,” Zeeb said. “We know how to work, how to treat each other, support each other and I feel that it's helpful for the next tournaments.”
One of Zeeb's best tournaments last year was the Darius Rucker Invitational, where she finished third.
Head coach Missy Farr-Kaye believes there will be a target on her team's back this season but knows that it will not affect her team's mentality.
“I take it as a compliment, we are considered one of the top teams this year,” Farr-Kaye said. “My biggest goal this year, that we have already been talking about, is how to not have that target translate into pressure.”
Zeeb acknowledged that the team knows how to handle pressure better now considering that cameras followed the team throughout the national championship tournament.
“It’s an honor to be targeted,” Zeeb said.
Farr-Kaye has won three national titles during her time with the Sun Devils – one as a player, one as an assistant coach and, most currently, one as the head coach.
“I’ve told them back in May, that it is the coolest experience ever,” Farr-Kaye said. “Once you're a national champion, you're a national champion for the rest of your life.”
As the new season begins the team is hungry for another chance at a national championship.
“People will want to beat us, but I think that it’s important for us to realize what we accomplished, but at the same time move on,” Liti said. “It’s a new season, we have new goals and new things that we want to accomplish.”
Reach the reporter at sbemanue@asu.edu or follow @SebastianEman24 on Twitter.
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