Huskers Close Fall at Alamo Invitational

The Nebraska women's golf team closes its fall season when the Huskers travel to San Antonio, Texas, to take part in the Alamo Invitational, Oct. 31-Nov. 2.

The 14-team tournament begins on Hallween with 18 holes. The Huskers will tee off at 11 a.m. On Monday, the Huskers will take to the Briggs Ranch Golf Club course at 11 a.m. for the second round, before concluding the three-day event on Tuesday with a shotgun start at 8:30 a.m.

The Huskers will take aim at a par-72, 6,302-yard layout at Briggs Ranch with a field that features four other Big 12 Conference teams (Baylor, Colorado, Kansas State, Texas A&M).

Freshman Steffi Neisen will play out of the top spot in a youthful Husker lineup. Neisen is coming off the best tournament of her career, when she tied for ninth with a career-best 223 at the Dale McNamara Invitational in Owasso, Okla., Oct. 11-13.

Neisen will be one of three Husker freshmen competing in Texas, joining Remylee Molyneux and Katelyn Wright.

Junior Madeleine Sheils, who is coming off a solid 15th-place showing in Oklahoma, will be the most experienced player in the NU lineup. The Husker top five will be without senior Mary Kate Bird for the third straight event, after Bird underwent surgery for an illness in mid-October. Bird will miss the final three tournaments of the fall, but is expected to return for the spring season.

Live scoring of the tournament will be provided by GolfStat.com, with day-by-day recaps available on Huskers.com.

The Alamo Invitational

Host: UTSA
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Course: Briggs Ranch Golf Club
Par: 72 - Yardage: 6,302
Tee Times (All Times Central)

• Sunday, Oct. 31 (18) - 11 a.m.
• Monday, Nov. 1 (18) - 11 a.m.
• Tuesday, Nov. 2 (18) - 8:30 a.m.

Nebraska Lineup

1. Steffi Neisen
2. Madeleine Sheils
3. Kayla Knopik
4. Remylee Molyneux
5. Katie Keiser

Nebraska Individual: Katelyn Wright

The Alamo Invitational Field (14 Teams): Baylor, Central Arkansas, Central Florida, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas State, Notre Dame, SMU, TCU, Texas A&M, Tulane, Tulsa, UTSA, Wisconsin

Live Scoring: Golfstat.com

Freshman Neisen Leads Huskers in Oklahoma
Steffi Neisen matched her career best with a final-round 73 to tie for ninth at the Dale McNamara Invitational on Oct. 13.

Neisen, a true freshman from New Prague, Minn., closed the three-day tournament with a career-best 223 (77-73-73) over three rounds on the par-72, 6,450-yard layout at the Patriot Golf Club to produce her first career top-10 finish.

Neisen's 73 matched Kennesaw State's Patricia Arana for the fifth-best round of the day among the 90 golfers in the tournament field.

Husker Madeleine Sheils also moved up the leaderboard in the final round, bouncing back from a second-round 81 to shoot a two-over-par 74. Sheils, a junior from Boise, Idaho, tied for 15th place at 227, including NU's best round in the tournament with an opening-round 72.

Neisen and Sheils helped the Huskers to a 14th-place team finish in a talented 16-team field. Oklahoma won the tournament with a 54-hole score of 877, 13 shots ahead of both Texas and Oklahoma. The hosts from Tulsa took fourth at 903.

Oklahoma's Ellen Mueller led the tournament from start to finish, winning by seven strokes with a seven-under-par 209. Mueller's tournament included an opening-round 67 and a final-round 69. Tulsa's Kristina Merkle finished second with an even-par 216.

Junior Kayla Knopik settled for an 84 in the final round to slip into a tie for 55th at 239. Knopik's round snapped a streak of 10 consecutive rounds of better than 80 to open the season.

True freshman Katelyn Wright finished with a three-round total of 245 in a tie for 71st as an individual outside the NU lineup. Freshman Remylee Molyneux tied for 74th at 250, while junior Carolyn Schorgl tied for 80th with a 253.

Sheils Fires Career Best at Marilynn Smith/Sunflower Invite
Madeleine Sheils produced the best tournament finish of her career by tying for third while helping Nebraska to a fourth-place finish at the 12-team Marilynn Smith/Sunflower Invitational, Sept. 27-28.

Sheils, a junior from Boise, Idaho, matched her career-best three-round total on a par-72 course with a 223. Her tie for third surpassed her previous career-best tie for seventh at the 2010 Northern Migration in Florence, Ariz.

Freshman Steffi Neisen tied for 15th with a 230 on the 6,279-yard layout of the Alvamar Country Club in Lawrence, Kan. Mary Kate Bird added a tie for 18th at 232, while junior Kayla Knopik tied for 23rd (78-78-77-233). 

Bird, Sheils Return to Lead New Look HuskersNebraska's lone senior Mary Kate Bird returned to lead a young and relatively inexperienced Husker women's golf team into the 2010-11 season.

Bird, a three-year letterwinner from Kansas City, Mo., has competed in 72 rounds in the NU lineup and owns 11 career top-25 finishes, including a runner-up finish at the 2008 Chip-N Club Invite.

Bird is joined in a leadership role by junior Madeleine Sheils. Nebraska's top finisher at the 2010 Big 12 Championships, Sheils just missed All-Big 12 honors with her 11th-place showing. The Boise, Idaho, native's performance and confidence peaked at the end of a strong sophomore season.

Last year, Sheils competed in 31 rounds and posted a strong 76.35 stroke average, nearly seven strokes better than her rookie campaign in 2008-09. Her 76.35 represented the third-best stroke average by a sophomore in school history.

As a junior, Sheils will look for continued improvement on the course. The two-time NGCA Scholastic All-American will also continue her excellence in the classroom.

Knopik Hopes to Continue Climb in 2010-11
Nebraska native Kayla Knopik enjoyed a breakout 2010 spring season that concluded with her tie for 39th at the Big 12 Championships.

The junior from Papillion, Neb., is in her fourth season in the Nebraska women's golf program in 2010-11, after earning a spot in NU's starting five late last spring.

Knopik, who has continued to improve each season at Nebraska, made the most of her opportunity last season by notching a 78.22 stroke average over 18 rounds. Her average represented a 4.61-stroke per round improvement over her redshirt freshman campaign in 2008-09, when she played just six rounds.

She produced a career-best tie for 14th at the 2010 BYU at Entrada Classic with a season-best three-round score of 230.

After a solid summer that included a fifth-place finish at the Nebraska State Stroke Play Championship and a third-place showing at the Eastern Stroke Play, Knopik has shown that her game continues to improve. She owns NU's No. 2 stroke average (78.09) and has been the Huskers' most consistent scorer through the first 10 rounds of the young season (79-79-78-78-77-78-77-74-77-78). 

Schorgl Hoping for Breakout Season as Junior
Junior Carolyn Schorgl hopes to make an impact on the Nebraska lineup in her third season in the program in 2010-11. The Leawood, Kan., native has competed in 26 rounds in her first three years in the program, including an appearance in NU's top five at both the Johnie Imes and Dale McNamara Invitationals.

Last year at the Chip-N Club Invitational, Schorgl fired a career-best 73 in the final round. At the 2008 Chip-N Club, she produced a career-best three-round total of 232, which was good for 33rd in her first collegiate event.

A solid performer in the classroom and the community, Schorgl is a four-time Big 12 Commissioner's Honor Roll selection and a recipient of a 2010 Nebraska Student-Athlete HERO Leadership Award. 

Transfer Keiser Tries to Make Impact in Home State
Katie Keiser will try to make an impact on Nebraska's lineup after transferring from Winthrop before the start of the 2010-11 season. The Gothenburg, Neb., native spent her first two collegiate seasons at Winthrop University before joining the Huskers in the summer of 2010. She showed her abilities during the summer by finishing as the runner-up at the 2010 Nebraska State Stroke Play Championship on her home course in Gothenburg. Keiser (230) finished three shots back of former Husker JC Stevenson (227) in the 54-hole event. Current Husker teammate Kayla Knopik (239) added a fifth-place finish.

Keiser earned a lineup spot for the Huskers at the season-opening Chip-N Club Invitational and produced rounds of 79 and 83 in the rain-shortened event. 

Freshmen Plan to Lay Foundation for the Future
A talented three-player freshman class hopes to lay the foundation for future success in the Husker program.

Steffi Neisen, New Prague, Minn. (New Prague)
Steffi Neisen, a newcomer from New Prague, Minn., has made the quickest impact on the Husker program. A four-time top-seven finisher in the state of Minnesota's largest class of high school golf (AAA), Neisen has earned a spot in Nebraska's top five in each of NU's fall tournaments and owns NU's No. 2 stroke average (76.91).

A six-year varsity player at New Prague High School, Neisen was a five-time Missota Conference Player of the Year (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010), and a six-time all-conference selection.

Neisen posted NU's top finish with a tie for 29th (76-79-155) at the Chip-N Club Invite, before tying for 15th (75-74-81-230) at the Marilynn Smith/Sunflower Invite. She settled for a tie for 64th (238) at the Johnie Imes Invitational, before rebounding for a tie for ninth with a career-best 223 at the Dale McNamara Invitational.

Katelyn Wright, Incline Village, Nev. (Incline)
Fellow freshman Katelyn Wright comes to Nebraska as one of the most accomplished prep golfers in Husker history. A four-time Nevada High School state champion, she was the second player in Nevada history to accomplish that feat. As a senior, she won the title by 26 strokes with a two-under-par 142 over 36 holes. In 2008, she won the crown by 28 strokes.

Wright was also a four-time qualifier for the Callaway Junior World Championships and a three-time member and two-time captain of the Junior America's Cup team.

An outstanding all-around athlete, Wright was also a two-time state champion in track and field, and a first-team all-state basketball selection as a point guard on Incline High School's Class 2A team. Off the fields of competition, Wright was the Incline High School Student Body President in 2009-10, after serving as the junior class vice president in 2008-09.

Wright is a second generation Husker golfer, following in the footsteps of her mother, Shelly (Godeken) Wright, a two-time All-Big Eight golfer (1983, 1984).

Wright fired a 74 in the opening round of the Chip-N Club Invitational. She closed in a tie for 36th at her first collegiate event, playing outside of NU's lineup, before earning a lineup spot at the Marilynn Smith/Sunflower Invitational. She also traveled to the Dale McNamara Invitational as an individual.

Remylee Molyneux, Thousand Oaks, Calif. (Oaks Christian)
A talented golfer out of California, Remylee Molyneux comes to Nebraska after a successful high school and junior career. The 2009 Tri-Valley League Champion and 2008 Ventura County Junior Golfer of the Year at Oaks Christian High School, Molyneux has been a consistent winner over the past several seasons.

Molyneux won medalist honors in 11 of 15 high school tournaments as a junior in 2008, including the Tri-Valley League crown. She also assisted in coaching the middle school girls golf program at Oaks Christian.

She was the 2008 Ventura County Junior Golfer of the Year, winning four consecutive VCJGA tournaments in the summer of 2008, including the Ventura County State Stroke Play Championship. She fired a career-best 71 to win the Thousand Oaks Open on July 8, 2008. She also won a 15-18 California Junior Tour event at Buenaventura at the age of 15.

Molyneux matched fellow freshman Steffi Neisen for NU's top finish at the season-opening Chip-N Club Invitational. Playing as an individual outside of Nebraska's lineup, Molyneux fired rounds of 79 and 76 to tie for 29th. She competed as an individual at the Marilynn Smith/Sunflower Invite, before making her first career start at the Johnie Imes Invitational. She was also in NU's top five at the Dale McNamara Invitational.

Huskers Continue to Set the Pace in the Classroom
Three Huskers captured NGCA Scholastic All-America honors in 2010, pushing Nebraska's nation-leading total to 57 since 1989. JC Stevenson became the third Husker in history to be a four-time NGCA Scholastic All-American, while fellow 2010 senior Charlotte Wendner added the second NGCA honor of her career.

Sophomore Madeleine Sheils claimed the second NGCA Scholastic All-America award of her career, putting her on track to join Stevenson, Jackie Beste and Allison Stewart as a four-time award winner.