Oct. 8, 2007

SAMMAMISH, Wash. -

Complete First Round Results

UNLV women's golf opened play at the Edean Ihlanfeldt Invitational on Monday and the Rebels are currently eighth in the tournament, which is being played at the Sahalee Country Club.

The Rebels got off to a blistering start and were three under as a team through five holes but could not keep up that pace and finished with a team score of 213 (+24) after 18 holes of play.

No. 4 USC is the opening-round leader with a team total of 296 (+8), which was five strokes better than fellow Pac-10 member No. 3 Arizona State, which shot a 301 (+13). No. 15 Stanford (304, +16), No. 22 Cal (305, +17) and No. 7 Arizona (305, +17) round out the top five. Belen Mozo of USC and Anna Nordqvist of Arizona State share the first-round lead individually as both players carded a two-under 70 on the round. They hold a one-stroke lead over Mari Chun of Stanford and those three were the only players who broke par on the day.

Rebel freshman Alejandra Guacaneme had the strongest round of the day for the Rebels on the par-72, 6,172-yard course, shooting a four-over 76 that has her tied for 12th after the first round. She rolled in a birdie and 13 pars on her round, but also had three bogies and a costly double bogey on her round.

Just one stroke behind is sophomore Natasha Krishna, who is in a group that is tied for 20th after she shot a five-over 77. Another Rebel who broke 80 was Tonya Choate, who is tied for 36th after shooting a first-round score of 79 (+7) but the score could have been much lower. She was two-under after 10 holes but Choate had three double bogies and a trio of bogies to go with two birdies over the final eight holes on Monday.

UNLV freshman Therese Koelbaek shot an 80 (+18) and is tied for 41st and sophomore Melissa Mabanta is tied for 76th after she shot an 86 (+14).

The 16-team field for this year's event includes eight squads that are ranked in the latest Golf World/NGCA Golf Coaches' Poll: No. 3 Arizona State, No. 4 USC, No. 7 Arizona, No. 11 Pepperdine, No. 15 Stanford, No. 18 New Mexico, No. 20 BYU and No. 22 California. The field also includes Long Beach State, Oregon, Oregon State, Penn State, UNLV, San Francisco, Washington State and the host Huskies. Second round action on Tuesday begins at 10 a.m. (PT) with teams starting from both the 1st and 10th tees.

Fans can follow the tournament live by CLICKING HERE.

UNLV TEAM SCORE

8. UNLV 213 (+24)

UNLV INDIVIDUALS

T12. Alejandra Guacaneme 76 (+4)T20. Natasha Krishna 77 (+5)T36. Tonya Choate 79 (+7)T41. Therese Koelbaek 80 (+8)T76. Melissa Mabanta 86 (+14)