Even though women’s golf gained a few spots after the three-day tournament, the Huskies had their worst outing of the spring as they finished 12th out of 16 with a 939 (314-310-315) at the MSU Ocala Spring Invitational in Dunnellon, Fla.

NIU could not overcome the tough 16 team field during its fourth outing of the spring semester. Daytona State College earned top honors, firing an 889 (295-298-296.) Houston Baptist University and North Florida rounded out the top three both carding 299.

NIU failed to beat out two of the three MAC opponents who participated in the tournament, but did rally during the last round to catch Akron, which finished one spot behind in 13th.

The Huskies dug themselves an early hole after the first 18, shooting a 314 as a team, including 12 holes that were double bogeys or worse.

The result of the poor start landed them in 14th place with a lot of ground to be made up with two rounds still left to play.

After turning around and jumping two schools to finish in 14th, head coach Kim Kester is pleased with the hurdling the Huskies did, but the high scores the team put up is something that she’s not used to seeing from her girls so far this spring.

“It wasn’t a horrible tournament it just wasn’t one of our best,” Kester said. “We did alright, moved up a spot and finished the tournament out in 12th place. We’re just going to move on from here and look toward our next event at Bradley.”

Two bright spots were Lena Gautier (76-76-78) and Connie Ellett (76-75-79). The duo finished the MSU Ocala Spring Invitational tied for 25th out of 92 with their three day total of 230.

Ellett’s second round score of 75 allowed her to climb to 15th after two rounds, but prevailing to continue that mid 70s trend for her final round Tuesday was the reasoning behind her drop in the standings.

Sydney Brickey, who started NIU’s last outing at the Rio Verde Invitational knocking in a 71 which placed her in first, did just the opposite, hitting a first round card of 82 Sunday.

The freshman (77-79) came back the next two rounds scoring sub 80 rounds to finish 57th. Senior Jenny Niemiec climbed up six spots to finish 76th with a 247 (86-82-79.)

In her first tournament since Sept. 30, junior Casey LaBarbera finished 88th after shooting a 260 (80-84-96.)