For the first time in over three months, the Illinois women’s golf team got back on the greens to compete in a tournament last weekend.

The Illini traveled to Orlando, Florida to golf in the UCF Challenge hosted by the University of Central Florida from February 2-4. Despite losing a golfer due to injury in the middle of the tournament, the Illini finished 11th out of 16 teams.

After not golfing in a tournament since late October, when the team had its best finish of the fall season, the Illini were more excited than they were nervous to start competing again.

“We were really excited to come back into the competition mode, we went to Florida over (winter) break to practice on the grass too,” said junior Ali Morallos. “Everyone was just really excited to get back into competition mode after that.”

The excitement translated to success for the Illini at the beginning of the tournament, as they found themselves in first place after the first seven holes. Despite the early advantage, a poor performance on the final 11 holes knocked the Illini out first place. Illinois finished tied for eighth place at the end of day one, and Morallos led her team as she tied for fifth individually with a -2 in the round.

“A round is 18 holes, and we did start really well that day, but we didn’t finish. You gotta be able to finish, and we didn’t that day,” said head coach Renee Slone.

The Illini had another strong start on the front nine of the second round, but in a similar fashion to the first round, the team didn’t maintain positive momentum. Illinois dropped two spots to end the round in 10th place overall. Morallos remained tied for fifth with another under-par round.

Despite dropping two spots, the worst part of the round for the Illini came when senior Tristyn Nowlin had to leave due to a lower-back injury. Nowlin didn’t return for the rest of the invite but is expected to be healthy for the team’s next competition.

No replacement comes in when a player gets hurt, so the Illini were down a golfer for the rest of the match. Expectedly, since Nowlin is a top golfer on the team, Illinois didn’t improve in the final round. They dropped one more spot, finishing the invite in 11th place. Morallos finished the tournament at -1, tying for 21st place individually and emerging as Illinois’ top golfer for the match. The junior was pleased with her performance and happy to have stepped up for her team.

“Personally, I haven’t felt I’ve played that good of a tournament in a while, so it was kinda nice for the team,” Morallos said. “It’s definitely a motivator for the next few weeks.”

The Illini have already begun talking about what they need to work on in the next couple of weeks before competing again. Although she wasn’t pleased with how the season started, Slone hopes the team can use this experience to motivate and improve throughout the season.

“This certainly should set a fire under people,” Slone said. “This was not Illini golf in any way, shape or form, and we’re a much better team than that, so hopefully this gets us going.”

Illinois will get a couple of weeks off before going down south once again to compete. The ladies will travel to Peoria, Arizona to golf in the Westbrook Invitational hosted by the University of Wisconsin on February 23-24.