Ito Shoots Solid Opening Round at Regional

Lubbock, Texas - Nebraska women's golfer Merynn Ito fired an opening-round 73 to sit in a tie for 17th place at the NCAA Central Regional at The Rawls Course on Thursday.

"Merynn played well today," Nebraska Coach Robin Krapfl. "She was just really solid.  She was hitting fairways and greens for most of the day, and she came in with a good score.  Hopefully that will continue, and she can put up an even better score tomorrow."

Thursday's opening round was delayed by one hour because of fog on the 6,328-yard, par 72 layout at The Rawls Course in Lubbock.  When the fog lifted, the senior from Aiea, Hawaii played her way into contention heading into Friday's second round.  Ito's opening-round 73 is just three strokes out of second place.  Ito is scheduled to tee off at 11:50 a.m. for the second 18 holes of the three-round tournament.

Auburn's Diana Ramage produced the top score of the opening round with her four-under par 68. Lisa Ferrero from Texas and Christa Spedding from Texas A&M are tied for second after shooting first-round scores of 70 on Thursday.  Four golfers produced rounds of 71, while nine others shot even-par rounds of 72 to put themselves ahead of Ito on the leaderboard.

The top eight teams in the 24-team field, and the top two individual players who are not on the eight qualifying teams will earn a trip to the NCAA Championships in Sunriver, Ore., May 17-20.