The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
Jackson T. Stephens Cup
Kim wins individual medalist, No. 7 Women’s Golf runner-up at Stephens Cup
10.11.2023 | Women's Golf
Freshman Lauren Kim wins fourth playoff hole to capture top honors in the tournament.
DALLAS, Texas — The No. 7 University of Texas Women's Golf team fell 3-2 to No. 3 Wake Forest in the championship match of the Jackson T. Stephens Cup at Trinity Forest Golf Club on Wednesday. Freshman Lauren Kim captured individual medalist honors as she won in a playoff to take the top spot.
Kim birdied 17 and 18 in round three on Tuesday to force a playoff at 11-under-par with Adela Cernousek of Texas A&M. They completed three playoff holes and had not determined a winner when play was suspended due to darkness on Tuesday evening. Kim came back on Wednesday morning and won the first playoff hole of the day and fourth overall to capture individual medalist honors.
The Longhorns shot seven-under-par on Tuesday and finished stroke play with their sixth-best 54-hole tournament score in program history at 841 (-23). They earned the No. 1 seed for the championship match against Wake Forest.
Bentley Cotton won her match 2&1 and Cindy Hsu won her match 4&3, but Wake Forest won the remaining three matches to capture the title.
The Longhorns earned head-to-head victories in stroke play over No. 1 Arkansas, No. 2 Stanford, No. 5 Texas A&M, No. 6 South Carolina and No. 18 Duke. Kim finished the tournament finishing higher than five returning Golfweek All-Americans from last season.
The Longhorns placed four individuals in the top-12 in the stroke play portion of the event. In addition to Kim at the top spot, Bohyun Park finished T4 and Bentley Cotton and Farah O'Keefe both finished stroke play at T12 on the individual leaderboard.
Head Coach Ryan Murphy
I thought we played great in the stroke play portion of the event. Several great rounds played and tons of birdies. Contributions from everyone and those 68's from Bo and the 69 from Bentley were particularly big for us.
Obviously Lauren Kim was stellar this week. To win against that field is sensational. Her finish in rounds 1 and 3 were phenomenal and those rounds book-ended a second round 67. Three terrific rounds and it was capped off with a great up and down for the victory in a four-hole playoff. I am obviously very proud of Lauren and there is more to come!
The match against Wake today was not what we envisioned. I'm proud of Cindy and Bentley for getting their wins, but overall we didn't have what we needed. We did some things well, but we've got to work on some things and be cleaner through the round. Match play is different. We need to familiarize ourselves with the nuances of it before the next time we play the format.
Players Mentioned
