DeKalb — The women’s golf team improved their overall team score over the course of three rounds and earned a sixth place finish in a 19-team field at the Ball State Cardinal Classic at the Players Club in Yorktown, Indiana.

The Huskies (300-298-297 — 895) had the third-best round in the field in the final round with a nine-over team score of 297, a score that was only worse than a 294 from Akron and a 294 from Indianapolis, who won the tournament.

Even with winning their last event, Head Coach Kim Kester said the team improved on aspects of their game this week.

“I thought we had a lot of improvements from our last tournament at Illinois State,” Kester said. “We all improved in our fairways hit and our greens hit [in regulation.] That was my biggest takeaway.”

The Huskies were led by freshman Sofia Gomez Enriquez Riart (75-71-75 – 221), who finished 12th place overall and had the team-best score for the tournament. Junior Kelly Anderson (72-77-73 – 222) tallied a top-20 overall finish, only one stroke behind Riart.

Sophomore Isabella Sumudio finished in the top-30 and junior Brielle Ward was in the top-50 of 100 players in the field.

Riart has finished in the top-15 overall in her first two collegiate events of her career, dating back to a 10th place finish at the Redbird Invitational Sept. 11. Kester said she is pleased with the play of her freshmen and is not surprised by their play.

“We just hope that [the freshmen] can keep doing what they have been doing,” Kester said. [Riart] has adjusted well to the college level. We are excited to see how she progresses through the year.

The Huskies fell to eighth place after shooting a 300 in round one and were unable to get into the top-five after that.

Kester said the team needs to get out to better starts in order to be competitive in future events and win tournaments.

The Huskies won the first event because of a good start in round one, and that is what Kester said the team needs to do to be competitive each week.

“We just had too many big numbers,” Kester said. “We should be making pars on the holes we start with, and it did not go our way in [the first round]. It was kind of a mix of everything going wrong in the beginning.”

The Huskies will continue their season Saturday at the Mary Fossum Invitational at Forest Acres Golf Course in Okemos, Michigan. The team has two events remaining in the fall season.