Oct. 7, 2010

NOTRE DAME, Ind. – The University of Notre Dame women’s golf team continue its season at the 2010 Mercedes Benz Championship this Fri., Oct. 8 through Sun., Oct. 10 at the Holston Hills Country Club in Knoxville, Tenn. The University of Tennessee will host the three-day event, which features 18-holes each day on the par-72, 6,302-yard course.

Traveling to Knoxville, Tenn. this weekend will be seniors So-Hyun Park (Seoul, South Korea/Bradenton Prep) and Katie Conway (Wading River, N.Y./Shoreham-Wading River) as well as junior Becca Huffer (Denver, Colo./Littleton). Freshmen Kristina Nhim (Cypress, Calif./Cypress) and seventh ranked (Golfstat) Nicole Zhang (Calgary, Alberta/ Bishop Carroll) will round out the five-man squad. Katie Allare (Phoenix, Ariz./Xavier Prep.) will compete for the Irish individually.

This year’s Mercedes-Benz Championship event will team up in support of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Each participating team will receive pink ribbons to display on its bag and will wear pink to promote “Pink Out” on Saturday.

THE COMPETITION: The 15th edition of the Mercedes-Benz Tournament will feature Arkansas (14), Chattanooga, Coastal Carolina, East Tennessee State University, Furman, Georgia State, James Madison, Kent State (18), Kentucky, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Texas Christian University, University of North Carolina at Greensboro and University of Texas-San Antonio.

THE MERCEDES BENZ COLLEGIATE CHAMPIONSHIP: Notre Dame will be appearing in the Mercedes Benz Collegiate Championship for the second consecutive season. In 2009 the Irish finished 9th (306-300-302-908) and were led by Becca Huffer (75-74-74-223).

The 2010 Mercedes-Benz Collegiate Championship is hosted by defending champion Tennessee.

Team Champions

1997 Duke 299-301-299=899

1998 Duke 306-295-291=892

1999 Georgia 297-303-306=906

2000 Duke 300-297-293=890

2001 Purdue 297-300-305=902

2002 Auburn 303-304-292=899

2003 Ohio State 296-292-296=884

2004 Ohio State 293-287-294=874

2005 Georgia 297-293-292=882

2006 Tennessee 298-298-291=887

2007 Florida 289-288-288=865 (TR)

2008 LSU 291-293-281=865 (TR)

2009 Tennessee 283-291-294= 868

Individual Winners

1997 Jenny Chuasiriporn (Duke) 69-72-71=212

1998 Stacy Prammanasudh (Tulsa)* 74-70-74=21

1999 Shauna Estes (Georgia)* 70-71-76=217

2000 Virada Nirapathpongporn (Duke) 76-70-69=215

2001 Kari Damron (Purdue) 71-74-72=217

2002 Ashley Orange (UNC) 72-70-76=218

2003 Allison Hanna (Ohio State) 73-69-75=217

2004 Violeta Retamoza (Tennessee) 72-68-71=211

2005 Amanda McCurdy (Arkansas) 70-74-69=213

2006 Jenny Suh (Alabama) 74-70-70=214

2007 Sandra Gal (Florida)* 69-71-70=210

2008 Lauren Doughtie (NC State) 68-73-68=209 (TR)

2009 Laura Anderson (Louisville) 72-70-71=213

Nathalie Mansson (Tennessee) 71-71-71=213

* won on a playoff

TR – Tournament Record

FORMAT: Each team’s lineup will be comprised of five golfers with the lowest four scores for each round counting towards the overall team score. The tournament will consist three 18-hole rounds played on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Along with individual competitors, Notre Dame will tee it up from hole 10 starting at 10:39 a.m. on Friday. Saturday and Sunday’s tee times are scheduled to begin at 9:00 a.m.

RESULTS: Live hole-by-hole scoring of the 2010 Mercedes Benz Women’s Collegiate Championship will be available through Golfstat. To access the site go to http://www.golfstatresults.com, while daily recaps will be posted on und.com.

–ND–