Injuries and graduated players left the Alabama women’s golf team shorthanded this fall season. Junior Janie Jackson has aggravated her hip and is expected to miss most of the fall. Without Jackson, the younger players have an opportunity to improve. One of those chances will be coming up at the Annika Intercollegiate Tournament this weekend.
“There’s a silver lining to everything I guess,” coach Mic Potter said. “With Janie Jackson being out, that means we are having one more inexperienced player that is getting more experience. So, I think it’s an elite field, but that is only going to help our younger players.”
The team will be playing top competition like the national champion Duke Blue Devils and runners-up USC Trojans. Twelve teams in all are competing, including South Carolina and Vanderbilt in the SEC.
“It’s pretty intense,” freshman Lakareber Abe said. “Every team is really good. You grow up playing against the same players you see in junior golf and you see them again in college golf. I think it definitely adds more to the competition, just knowing you have to go out there as team and we all have to be at our best to even have a chance at winning. It is always motivation to work harder.”
Last week, the Crimson Tide placed No. 10 out of 12 teams in the Mason Rudolph Championship. The team did not get the results it wanted, but two freshmen got to benefit from their first ever collegiate tournament. Abe finished No. 14 overall, the highest on the team. She finished with a score of five over par.
“There’s a certain component of being successful, and that is getting experience in pressure situations. She [Abe] got around the lead, and next time she will be better in that position, having gone through it in this tournament. She is a really solid player,” Potter said.
Potter believes the team needs to focus only on improvement right now and not anything that is going on outside of the team that they cannot control. Injuries happen. Comparisons between Alabama and other programs will be made, but Alabama has no control over that. Improvement week to week is the goal, and sophomore Mia Landegren believes the future is bright.
“I think the next tournaments to come will be a lot of fun because I think anything is possible for our team,” Landegren said.
