The Oregon women’s golf team wrapped up its fall season with a win at the East Lake Championship in Atlanta on Oct. 29. The win marked Oregon’s first team win of the season, taking a 4-1 victory over the Northwestern Wildcats. The all-around team victory puts the Ducks in a strong position to end the fall portion of the season, putting them in the race for title contention early on in the year. The win put the Ducks at No. 3 in the national rankings heading into the break and is head coach Derek Radley’s 12th victory during his tenure at Oregon.

Due to poor weather conditions, all matches at East Lake were moved to very early in the morning with freshman Sophie Han teeing off at 5:20 a.m. She opened the match with a tone-setting win against Ashley Yun, hitting a birdie on the 14th hole that secured the win.

Things evened up for Northwestern after Duck freshman Shyla Singh lost to Dianna Lee in a 5&4 defeat in the second round. Sophomore Tong An struggled through the initial holes in the third round, but a late comeback in the final holes secured a close win to go up 2-1 heading into the fourth round.

Star junior and No. 3-ranked individual player in the country Kiara Romero took a late victory against Megan Meng in the final round to seal the tournament win for the Ducks. She never trailed, and was up four shots through the seventh hole.

Sophomore Suvichaya Vinijchaitham dominated in similar fashion, taking down Arianna Lau by one stroke but never trailed against her through the final round.

“Incredibly proud of our team for what they’ve accomplished this week,” Radley said to GoDucks. “The East Lake Cup is one of  the most prestigious events in college golf and it really feels like postseason competition when you’re out there on the course.”

A team win at East Lake is a great way to cap off the fall season, and more importantly, gets Oregon where it needs to be if they want to compete for a national championship. The Ducks previously got off to a rocky start, losing to Texas in their first matchup and taking second place against No. 1-ranked Stanford.

“To finish first in stroke play and then put together two wins in match play, including today against the reigning national champions, that’s not easy to do and I’m really impressed with the way our ladies carried themselves throughout the tournament,” Radley said.

Oregon has over two months off before its next matchup, which will be the Therese Hession Regional Challenge in Palos Verdes, California. The tournament will host 16 teams from all over the county including Big Ten teams like UCLA, USC and Ohio State.

If the Ducks can carry this momentum into the spring, they could easily cement themselves as national championship contenders. A run could start with a win against the Trojans (currently No. 2 in the national rankings after a successful fall season) at the Therese Hession Regional — or it at least would be a major step in the right direction.