“Ariana has a high golf IQ and was one of the best players in the state coming out of her class. She loves to practice and loves to play and will be great in our team room,” Chadwell said. “I am excited to have her join our program and make an impact with us during her final two years.”
_ _
In 2018-19, Saenz competed in one tournament. As a freshman, she competed in 10 tournaments at Texas A&M and tied for fourth at the Bruzzy Challenge with a score of 223, thanks to a career-low 69 in the Second Round of that tournament.
_ _
For her impressive performance, she was honored as the SEC Golfer of the Week.
She had an 78.86 average as a freshman and a 83 average as a sophmore at A&M. She might have a high golf IQ as Chadwell claims, but can she score at the D1 collegiate level?
1 Like
Hopefully, she just needed a chance of scenery and a change of coaches to help her get going again.
1 Like
Possibly. Golf is such a head game. When you see a player that all of a sudden starts scoring much higher than their history has proved, in most casess in golf its between the ears unless there is something physical. My bet is mental.
She was a high performing junior. Her scores are now mid-level D2 and not D1. For a D1 player to make an impact on a top 40 program they need to be scoring 75 or below and really much below.
She had two collegiate coaches in 2 years at A&M with a legend coming in from USC during her 2nd year. Her new coach isn’t going to have a lot of time with a 83 average. Now she has three HC in three years. Hopefully Chadwell isn’t making his decisons from her junior career.
1 Like
That 83 average came from just one tournament.
2 Likes
True, the 83 average was from three rounds playing as an individual from the fall tournies. But her career average at A&M was a 79.03 across 11 tournaments over two years which was the worst scoring average on her A&M team of 8 according to GolfStat on an A&M team ranked 58 to the Coogs 30 rank.
http://golfstat.com/index.cfm?event=public.static&pg=teamschedule&tc=W112
Coogs 2019 rank of 30 vs A&M rank of 58
Compare to the 2018-2019 scoring averages of the Coogs:
She is going to have to get her scoring average below 76 to get any playing time over the long haul and really below 75 to make a reasonable contribution. We’ll see.
I am assuming Chadwell believes he can revive her junior and HS scoring versus what was witnessed at A&M to take a chance on some level of scholarship. This a rebuilding year by the Coogs with losing 4 seniors across a team of 8 with now 4 coming in. The A&M transfer isn’t close to the 3 Coog starters returning in Screen, Martinez, and Elich.
The team has a pretty decent Euro Fr coming in and a grad transfer from TCU who sat out the year but has a 76 career scoring avg and I believe a Fr from Texas. There will be competition for the 4th and 5th spots but those players need to be 76 or below. Anything above and the Coogs will slip in national ranking.
1 Like