Former Nevada golfer Louise Yi is advancing through the United States Women's Public Links Championships so far this week. The prestigious tournament is being played at the Jimmie Austin OU Golf Club in Norman, Okla.

In the round of 64 this morning, Yi faced off against Abby Newton of Katy, Texas. Yi, seeded 45th, beat the 20th seed 6 and 4 to advance to Thursday morning's round of 32 matchup against 52nd seed Krystal Quihuis.

Earlier this week, Yi shot rounds of 72-79 in the stroke play portion of the event to make the cut and move on to match play. A field of 156 players started the event and the top 64 advanced to match play, with Yi tying for 45th in the stroke play.

Follow along on the USGA Website.

We announced that the Wolf Pack men's golf and rifle teams had received the NCAA Public Recognition Award earlier this summer for having an Academic Progress Rate in the top 10 percent in the nation in their sports, but today we received a nice note of congratulations from NCAA President Mark Emmert to congratulate the teams on their academic achievement:

TO:	Chancellors and Presidents	]
	Directors of Athletics	]	of Institutions Sponsoring
	Faculty Athletics Representatives	]	NCAA Division I Sports
	Senior Compliance Administrators	]
	Senior Woman Administrators	]

FROM:    Mark Emmert 
                NCAA President.
 
SUBJECT:    2011-12 Public Recognition Award Memorandum. 

I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate your institution's recipients of the NCAA Public Recognition Award.  This honor is bestowed on teams with an NCAA Division I Academic Progress Rate in the top 10 percent of all squads in their respective sports.  The following list notes those teams at your institution that received this distinction.  A letter has been sent to each of the head coaches noted below acknowledging this academic success.

University of Nevada

Men's Golf
Mixed Rifle

Thank you for your leadership and support of the academic reform efforts.  These teams represent intercollegiate athletics at its best.  Once again, I congratulate you, the head coach, team, student-athletes, athletics department and institution for the outstanding academic achievements of these teams. 

The first edition of the GolftStat Rankings for the 2012-13 season were released on Wednesday and came with good news for the Nevada men's and women's golf teams.

Jacob Wilner's men's team were ranked 46th in the first rankings of the year while Chad Spencer's women's team came in at No. 58. Both numbers represent the best rankings for each program under the current head coach with both Wilner and Spencer in their third year at Nevada.

The Wolf Pack women's team is coming off a stretch of three tournaments in as many weeks with Nikki Prichard recording top-10 finishes in two of the events. The Nevada men's team is heading to its second tournament of the year this weekend as the Jim Rivers Intercollegiate will begin on Monday in Louisiana.

If you head out to the Reno-Tahoe Open at Montreux Golf and Country Club this weekend, you may see a few familiar Wolf Pack faces.

As part of our pledge to be "One Community, One Pack," Nevada Athletics has over 50 coaches and staff volunteering all to help out our community partners at the Reno-Tahoe Open. Wolf Pack staff are doing everything from helping to staff will call to walking the course as standard bearers.

Nevada fans are also encouraged to wear blue on the course to show their Wolf Pack pride and stop by the Pack Pavilion on the signature 17th green. Pack Pavilion will be open for all four rounds of the tournament is a great place to rest, visit with Wolf Pack coaches and staff and enjoy the course's signature hole.

Here is a photo of Wolf Pack fiscal specialist Tina Ruff who had the opportunity to walk the course with 2001 British Open champion David Duval this week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hope to see all of our fans out at the Reno-Tahoe Open this weekend!

 

Dan Hinxman of the RGJ has a nice item this week capturing the success of Nevada golf alums over the weekend. That includes Kirk Triplett (below) gaining his first career win on the Champions Tour and Charlie Wi finishing third at the Greenbrier event in West Virginia.

From Hinxman's Birdies and Bogeys column:
It was a good week for a couple of former Nevada golfers. Kirk Triplett, in his first season on the Champions Tour, won the Nature Valley First Tee Open at Pebble Beach on Sunday. Triplett, who won a Web.com Tour (formerly nationwide Tour) tournament last August, now has five professional wins on the U.S.'s top three tours, including three on the PGA Tour. Charlie Wi, who played at Nevada before transferring to Cal, tied for third at the Greenbrier Classic. The 18th-year pro has six top-threes and is still looking for his first PGA Tour win.

As part the Nature Valley First Tee Open, select junior golfers from First Tee programs also compete in the event and are paired with pros for a team event. Nevada recruit Kit Carson, a Sacramento native who will join the team this fall, played in the event and finished in fourth place along with Tour veteran Hal Sutton.

The Reno Gazette-Journal's Dan Hinxman wrote a nice feature on former Wolf Pack golfer Scott Smith who is playing in the U.S. Open starting this morning at the Olympic Club in San Francisco.

According to Hinxman, Smith, a Fallon native, is the second Northern Nevadan to be playing in the U.S. Open in the past 30 years.

Good luck to Smith and fellow former Wolf Pack golfers Michael Allen and Charlie Wi as play gets underway today. Allen tees off at 9:01 a.m. this morning, Smith is set for 9:12 a.m. and Wi goes off at 1:07 p.m.  

Three former Wolf Pack golfers - Michael Allen, Scott Smith and Charlie Wi - will hit the links at this week's U.S. Open at the Olympic Club in San Francisco.

Smith, who finished his stellar Wolf Pack career last year, is competing in his second professional event after receiving an exemption to play in last year's Reno-Tahoe Open. 

Here is a nice article about Smith by Thomas Ranson of the Tahoe Daily Tribune.

Nevada fans can also follow the former Wolf Pack players' progress at the USGA's U.S. Open website. 

For the fourth straight year, Nevada has seen one of its men's golfers selected for the NCAA Regionals. This morning, senior Kevin Lucas will tee off at the Norman Regional hosted by Oklahoma. He is one of five individuals competing alongside 14 teams. Lucas must be the low individual not amongst one of the top five teams to advance to the NCAA Championships.

As men's golf coach Jacob Wilner said yesterday, 2011-12 has been a stellar season for Lucas, who registered eight top-20 finishes in 11 starts, including a victory in the fall at the Pacific Invitational. A juco transfer, Lucas earned All-WAC honors each of his two seasons at Nevada.

He also set the bar for one of the youngest teams in the country as Nevada often sent Lucas and at least three (sometimes four) freshmen to compete during the course of the year. The Wolf Pack had some bright moments during the course of the season, highlighted by Lucas's play and a glimpse at the future with such a young team.

Today is the first day of the three-day, 54-hole regional. Click here for more information, including live scoring.

Congratulations to former Nevada golfer Michael Allen on his win on Sunday at the Encompass Insurance Pro-Am. It was his second win on the Champions Tour.

Allen competed for the Wolf Pack from 1978-82 and has gone on to a successful professional golf career. He is currently ranked first in the Charles Scwab Cup standings on the Champions Tour and narrowly missed his first win of the season after finishing second at last month's Mississippi Gulf Resort Classic.