Day one of the East Lansing Regional is in the books and Michigan State women’s golf finished the round tied for the most birdies of any team with 17.

However, some mistakes cost the Spartans, especially on the par three and par four holes, as they ended the day tied for sixth place.

“I think we certainly had enough birdies to do what we needed to do,” 27th year head coach Stacy Slobodnik-Stoll said. “And then we made a lot of mistakes, I would say, on holes that we should be able to play better than that with it being our home course.”

The course was playing a bit slower than the Spartans thought, partly due to the rain in recent days, which may have caused some trouble for the golfers. What also caused some trouble was a mistake on the final hole of the round for Paula Balanzategui.

She hit the wrong ball on her second shot on the par three ninth hole and was forced to take a two-stroke penalty. Balanzategui ended up finishing the hole with a triple bogey, dropping her score from -1 to +2.

Balanzategui had the best score out of the five Spartans until she got the triple bogey on the ninth hole. Her round began with three straight bogeys, but she settled in with five birdies throughout the round.

“I think she played great,” Slobodnik-Stoll said about Balanzategui. “Again, she started out a little (shaky) and then made enough birdies to get herself right back into it.”

The team, in general, started out a little shaky. The five Spartans had a total of seven bogeys on holes 10, 11 and 12.

They began to rally back near the end of their first nine holes. Katie Lu had an eagle on the par five 17th hole. Balanzategui had birdies on the 17th and 18th hole. Leila Raines had three straight birdies to end her first nine holes of the round.

Slobodnik-Stoll thought their familiarity with the course started to pay off after the Spartans got off to a shaky start.

“Where I think that paid off is after we got through the first couple of holes and we didn’t start very well,” she said. “Patty, our assistant coach (Patricia Sanz Barrio), said ‘they’re going to settle down, they’re going to shake off the nerves, this is their home.’ Certainly, she was correct.”

Brooke Biermann ended the round with an even 72 score. She was the most consistent Spartan on the golf course on Monday. Biermann had two birdies, two bogeys and 14 pars.

“I think some shots coming into the green, some putts too,” Biermann said about how her course knowledge helped. “There is for sure some putts that you don’t realize you have to play so high and then you really do because they break so much. Things like that are really helpful and just having, of course, course knowledge, having played so many rounds here, it’s really important.”

For Biermann, her course knowledge also helped ease her nerves coming into the round.

“Sometimes the unknown is what makes you the most nervous,” Biermann said. “However, when you realize I’ve played this so many times. I’ve seen a lot of good shots out here. I can do it.”

Lu made a big par putt on the ninth hole, the final hole of the day. That came right after Balanzategui’s triple bogey, so it was extra important for momentum that Lu delivered in an important moment.

“That was a lengthy putt and I made it so it’s definitely going to give me some momentum and confidence with my stroke,” Lu said about her putt on the ninth hole.

Valentina Rossi began her round with a birdie on the tenth hole, but she struggled through the rest of her round. She had three double bogeys and five bogeys to go along with just two birdies.

Michigan State ended the day with a team score of +3. The lowest four scores on each team of five golfers count toward the team total. Rossi's individual score of +9 did not count toward Michigan State's team score.

That puts the Spartans tied with Oklahoma State in sixth place, one stroke behind the fifth-placed Denver Pioneers. The top five teams after 54 holes over three days will advance to the NCAA Championships.

The Spartans aren’t in the top five at the moment, but they remain well within striking distance.

“We just talk about what we can do better and you just pump these kids up,” Slobodnik-Stoll said about the approach moving forward. “This is such a mental game and they’ve gotta know you believe in them. And we know we can do it as a team. And hope that they have that attitude all day tomorrow and fight.”

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Join the discussion on this article in our premium forums by clicking here.

You can also follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Threads, TikTok, and Instagram.

For video content, including our Red Cedar Radar podcast, find us on YouTube and consider subscribing.