Middle Tennessee wins historic start with Golfweek/Stifel Spring Challenge title

Perhaps nobody knew what drama was possible down the stretch at Caledonia Golf and Fish Club in Pawley’s Island, South Carolina, quite like Middle Tennessee State head coach Lauren Wamsley.

After all, Wamsley’s team fell short of Coastal Carolina a year ago at the Golfweek/Stifel Intercollegiate despite a final-round charge. So this year, Middle Tennessee flipped the script and, in the process, earned something historic.

“The finish, it was so exciting,” Wamsley said. “We knew those three (closing) holes were probably the three toughest on the golf course but they had a good game plan and I was so proud of the team – they kept their composure, stepped up and hit really difficult shots in really tough conditions.”

The Golfweek/Stifel Spring Challenge.

This time, Middle Tennessee edged Coastal Carolina by a single shot in the final round and by three shots for the tournament. Middle Tennessee finished the event at 24 over and led a tightly packed leaderboard where six teams finished within six shots.

By winning at Caledonia, the Blue Raiders now have a fall start lined up in Columbus, Georgia.

For the past five years, the Golfweek/Stifel Spring Challenge has run concurrently with a men’s tournament of the same name across the street from Caledonia at another Mike Strantz design: True Blue Golf Club. The winner of that event receives an exemption into the Augusta Haskins Award Invitational the following year, and this year, the women gained a similar carrot.

Middle Tennessee becomes the first team to play its way into the inaugural Haskins Women’s Intercollegiate, a 12-team event to be played at the Country Club of Columbus in October 2026. The field already includes Arkansas, Auburn, Pepperdine, SMU and LSU.

“Kind of from the get-go, I’d always told them about it,” Wamsley said of what was on the line at Caledonia. “I was like, this is such a great opportunity and it’s pretty rare in women’s golf to get that opportunity, so let’s take advantage and just go into it like, what a privilege to play in a tournament that gets a cool invite.”

Alabama Birmingham, the team that Connecticut edged for first place, claimed the individual champion Alejandro Fierro, who was 9 under for the week.

Wamsley sees the benefit of the upcoming experience in the fall in big ways. Competing against larger programs is always eye-opening and a good opportunity to learn. As for what her team accomplished at Caledonia, well, that could be season-changing in the near-term.

“I think it did help us prepare for conference a little bit, which we go to here in a little over a week and a half,” she said of the Conference USA Championship. “It adds a little bit of pressure but I think that’s a good experience for us.”

Wamsley, in her second season at the helm at Middle Tennessee, led the Blue Raiders to victory last season at the Cardinal Cup. The Blue Raiders’ schedule also featured such big events as the Mercedes-Benz Intercollegiate and the Mason Rudolph Championship.

Wamsley started three players at the Stifel event who had seen Caledonia before: Jillian Bowman (T-8), Abbie Lee (T-20) and Ella Manley (T-58). The team also got a big lift from Isabella Johnson’s T-5 individually and Caroline Pardue’s T-10.

Samford’s Grace Engel and Charleston Southern’s Katie Stephens shared the individual title at 5 under.

With a solid mix of experienced players and underclassmen – Johnson and Pardue are both sophomores – Wamsley likes to say her team is not rebuilding but just updating.

“As a program, we’re starting to click,” she said. “Any team win we can get it just propels us further and further.”

This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Middle Tennessee golf team wins, earns Haskins invite