The North Carolina women's golf team will enter this coming fall looking to bounce back after a lackluster 2018-19 season. Last year, the team's best showing came during the Bryan National Collegiate tournament, where it placed second over the three-day tournament. UNC also placed fourth in the two-day Tar Heel Classic tournament.
Other high finishes came in the Brickyard Collegiate tournament, where UNC tied for fourth before the competition was cut short by weather. UNC also came in seventh in both the Mason Rudolph Championship and the Ruth's Chris Tar Heel Invitational.
For the second year in a row, the Tar Heels will open their season in Charleston, South Carolina with the Cougar Classic, where they captured ninth place over the course of two days in 2018. Both sophomore Nicole Lu and senior Brynn Walker finished with under-par rounds in the hurricane-shortened tournament.
The team lost two seniors in Kelly Whaley and Clementina Rodriguez. Whaley started for North Carolina in every tournament in her career and set a school record for the lowest stroke average in a season with 73.24. She also won two individual tournaments during her time at UNC: the Cougar Classic in the 2016-17 season and the Briar's Creek Invitational in 2017-18.
Rodriguez transferred from the University of Washington in 2017, and appeared as an individual in five tournaments in 2017-18.
The team will be highlighted this year by sophomore Jennifer Zhou, the former No. 8 player in the recruiting class of 2018. Zhou finished with a team best 2-under-par 70 stroke game in the NCAA tournament, and was also named to the All-ACC Women's Golf Team at the end of the season. The Kunming, China native finished out the year with a 73.25 stroke average, good for second best in team history behind Whaley's 73.24.
Walker also had a strong performance in the NCAA tournament. She shot 1-under-par 71, and finished with an eagle on the 11th hole. Walker has started every game of her UNC career, and had a stroke average of 74.36 for the 2017-18 season.
Lu arrived at North Carolina with Zhou, both of whom started in every tournament for UNC in the fall, and finished the fall season with a stroke average of 76.1. Her season best came at 1-under-par 71 in the first round of the Cougar Classic, and her best tournament finish came at the Ruth's Chris Tar Heel Invitational where she tied for 23rd overall.
Ava Bergner is a junior who, in the 2017-18 season, set the record for UNC at the Ruth's Chris Tar Heel Invitational with 10-under-par on 206 strokes.
