Svicarovich Ready for NCAA Golf Finals

Svicarovich Ready for NCAA Golf Finals

5/17/2005

SUNRIVER, Ore. — Vanderbilt’s Kristen Svicarovich began her season with a bang but saved the best until last and as a result is participating in the 2005 NCAA Women’s Golf Championships here today through Friday.

It will be another welcome homecoming of sorts for the personable sophomore from nearby Hillsboro, Ore.

“The Sunriver Resort is not far from my hometown,” Svicarovich says, “so I will know a lot of people at the tournament. My parents will be there, so will my swing coach and quite a few friends.”

As a result, Kristen says she expects to be in a comfort zone despite the otherwise intensity of the NCAA Championships.

“It simply feels good to me when I get back to the west coast,” she admits. “Even when we play at Stanford I feel as though I’m at home so playing in my home state is a real treat.”

Svicarovich and her Vanderbilt teammates have already played the Sunriver Resort this season and she has reason for optimism. She led the Commodore team by placing 13th individually at the highly competitive NCAA Preview Tournament last September.

“I’ve played Sunriver quite a few times in junior tournaments,” she says. “I like the course as it sets up well for me. It is a course that requires you to place the ball and one of my strengths is that I can hit it straight.

I know the course will be set up to play more difficult for this event,” she continues. “They will have the rough longer and the greens rolling faster but there will be some good scores put up on this course.”

Svicarovich is the only Commodore playing in the finals, qualifying as an individual by placing ninth at the recent NCAA East Regional at the University of Florida.

While Kristen is elated to be competing, she makes it known quickly that she is disappointed and somewhat sad to be the only one on her team out west.

“The rest of our team trained just as hard through the year as I did,” she acknowledges. “We talked all season about peaking at the right time and we just missed qualifying at the regional. We came so close. I think it bodes well for us next year.”

Svicarovich is looking forward to an old friend who also qualified as an individual.

“I played a lot of junior golf with Oregon’s Johnna Nealy,” Kristen notes, “and since there are only six of us qualified individually we are certain to get paired together for at least one of the rounds. It will be fun.”

Kristen’s year has not been all sunshine. After starting strong at the NCAA Preview, despite having tonsillitis, she continued to be plagued by illness throughout the fall. Those problems culminated in having her tonsils removed over the December holiday break.

“I didn’t touch a club for nearly a month,” she recalls, “and it seemed that much of this spring I was trying to catch-up. I am very glad to have those problems behind me.”

Svicarovich, a civil engineering major, was earlier this spring named to the Southeastern Conference’s Good Works Team which honors community service.