The women’s Pacific-10 Conference Golf Championships turned sour long after the teams had accepted their trophies at the Eugene Country Club Wednesday night.
After all the scorecards had been turned in, it was discovered that Southern California freshman Mikaela Parmlid — who won the tournament on a one-hole playoff over USC teammate Candie Kung — had signed a scorecard with a score that read 73 instead of 74. Parmlid’s final round score was disqualified, causing USC to drop from second to sixth place in the final standings. Kung was crowned the champion of the tournament.
“This is supposed to be hers,” Kung said of the individual title.
No. 1-ranked Arizona won its third Pac-10 team title in four years, beating out No. 7 Stanford by 18 strokes. No. 26 Oregon finished a disappointing seventh, with only junior Jerilyn White (223, ninth overall) finishing in the top 10. However, head coach Renee Baumgartner is confident that her team can perform well in the upcoming west regionals.
“We’re a very experienced team,” Baumgartner said. “Regionals are going to be a different story; there’s a lot of teams that have never been there before.”
But Baumgartner and the Pac-10 officials who made the tournament run smoothly until the final day are still wondering what happened to USC’s Parmlid.
In Pac-10 golf, there are no official scorers, so each member of Parmlid’s three-person playing group was keeping score for another member. Allegedly, UCLA’s Amanda Moltke-Leth, who was keeping score for Parmlid, initially wrote down the freshman’s score on the par-four 14th hole correctly as a par. When the group sat down to tally the scores after the round was over, Parmlid changed that to what she thought was the correct score: a birdie three.
“Our whole team is wondering how you could sign a wrong scorecard,” Kung said. “Especially when it’s a birdie or a par. You’re on the green and you one-putt, or you’re on the green and you two-putt. That’s pretty much the whole thing.”
After the playoff and the awards ceremony that followed, tournament officials were told about the discrepancy, and Parmlid’s score was disqualified.
Several season awards were announced at the ceremony following the tournament. Kung, Parmlid and Moltke-Leth were named to the All Pac-10 team, along with Arizona senior and No. 1-ranked Jenna Daniels, Arizona State freshman Miriam Nagle and Arizona sophomore Cristina Baena. Nagle won newcomer of the year honors, the first time the award has been awarded by the Pac-10. Arizona head coach Todd McCorkle won the coach of the year award.
“I just show them where the tee is and they make me look good,” McCorkle said.
The Ducks will head to the West Regionals with the rest of the Pac-10 in less than two weeks. The tournament will be held in Tempe, Ariz., May 11-13.

Ducks finish fourth

at men’s Pac-10s
The men’s golf team beat the Arizona heat for the third straight day and ended up eight-under par — and somehow in fourth place — at the Pac-10 Championships.
The Ducks were unlucky to play some of their best golf of the year the same three days that No. 4 Arizona State played their best golf of the decade. No. 39 Oregon State shot some of their best golf ever to finish second, and No. 50 California did well to finish in third.
“Our guys fought and played hard,” Oregon head coach Steve Nosler said. “We just didn’t get the career rounds that we needed in order to win.”
Arizona State did get a career round out of junior sensation Paul Casey. The Surrey, U.K., native broke Tiger Woods’ Pac-10 record for a par-72 course, shooting a 23-under par 265 to win his third straight Pac-10 individual title. The title was Arizona State’s sixth straight Pac-10 crown.
Oregon senior co-captain Ryan Lavoie joined freshman Chris Carnahan at 12th place overall to lead the Ducks. Lavoie shot a four-under par 68 on the final day and improved his score every round. Carnahan did not have a round above 73 all week.
“Ryan is definitely our team leader,” Nosler said. “It showed this week.”
The men, unlike the women, will play one more tournament before the West Regionals in Fresno, Calif., May 18-20. The Ducks play in the U.S. Intercollegiate in Palo Alto, Calif., May 6 and 7.