Mt. SAC wins close match at Mesa Linda

Although it received one of its toughest challenges of the year, the Mt. San Antonio women's golf team edged past the conference competition to win this week's conference match hosted by Orange Coast College at the Costa Mesa Country Club's Mesa Linda course.

Mt. San Antonio posted a team score of 338, while Desert was two strokes back at 340 and Mt. San Jacinto was four strokes back at 342.

Melanie Stark of Cuyamaca shot a 7-over-par 77 to earn her first medalist honors for the season while Irvine Valley's Hyerin Kim posted a 78 and both Emily Lewis of Orange Coast and Fumika Matsumoto of Desert carded 79s to be the only four golfers to break 80.

Mt. SAC used a balanced attack and saw its top four players each post scores in the mid-80's as Sarah Juelch and Victoria Rodarte posted 84's while Tiffany Lin and Lucy Yu each carded 85's.  Desert utilized the more-common stair-step scoring as Yi Chen Tsai posted an 82, Kabrea Rosas added an 85, and Nadia Herrera capped the scoring with a 94 to go with Matsumoto's 79.  Mt. San Jacinto benefitted from Amanda Arnold's 81 and Ashley Coy's 82 while Jane Lee (89) and Taylor Brown (90) accounted for the rest of the Eagles' team score.

Rebecca Peng of Irvine Valley added an 81 to Kim's 79, but the remaining Lasers posted scores in the mid-90's.

The OEC women's golf circuit continues on Wednesday, October 7, as conference-leading Mt. San Antonio hosts an event on the El Prado golf course.