Sept. 5, 2008

WINSTON-SALEM - Ever since a tenth-place finish at the 2008 NCAA Championships last spring, the 12th-ranked Wake Forest women's golf team has been eagerly awaiting the start of the 2008-09 season. The day has final come, as the Deacons will play in the NCAA Fall Preview on Sept. 7-8 at the Caves Valley Golf Club in Owings Mills, Md.

The first two rounds will be played on Sunday with the final round scheduled for Monday morning.

Head coach Diane Dailey, who will be starting her 21st season at the helm of the program, also has high hopes for this season.

"We are really looking forward to getting back into competition," Dailey said. "We had some really low qualifying scores, some of our best qualifying scores ever. So I think the students are excited about playing. They're excited about the prospects for the year and we just want to get into the fray a little bit and see how we stack up. Coming off of a tenth place finish last year, we're excited to get going this year."

The Deac's starting lineup will consist of sophomore Natalie Sheary, seniors Nannette Hill, Jean Chua, junior Dolores White and freshman Cheyenne Woods.

Hill and Sheary are coming off of impressive 2007-08 seasons which saw both players earn All-ACC honors. Sheary was also named the ACC Rookie of the Year and earned Golf Week Honorable Mention All-American honors.

The pair also became the first two Deacons to win back-to-back medalist honors as Hill won the Landfall Tradition after a school-record 66 in the second round and Sheary won the Northrop Grumman Regional Challenge. Sheary sported the lowest stroke average last season at 74.2 while Hill was close behind her at 74.8.

This summer, both Hill and Sheary qualified for the U.S. Women's Amateur and Sheary finished second at the CIGNA Golf Classic on the DURAMED Futures Tour. As a result, Sheary was named by Golf World as a Top 50 Female Golfer to Watch in 2008.

"Both Nannette and Natalie had very good summers and I think both are capable of being All-Americans this season," Dailey commented. "Both of them have the ability to shoot under par consistently. Nannette shot 66 and Natalie shot 68 in our first qualifier and those are the types of scores we need to really score well."

"If we can be right around 293 every round, we are going to be in good shape," Dailey continued. "One of my goals for this year is to be close enough to have a chance going into the final round of every tournament. Sometimes we'll win and sometimes we won't but the more times we can put ourselves in those situations, the better off we'll be by the end of the year."

White and Chua are also looking for a good start to the season. Despite playing just eight rounds last year, White managed the third-best stroke average on the team at 75.3. She had a good summer and played well in qualifying this fall.

Chua played 28 rounds as a junior and averaged 77.7 with the second-lowest round of the season, a two-under 68 in the final round of the Lady Gator Invitational. She has a career stroke average of 76.6 and is looking to finish her career off with her best season yet.

Sunday will also be the debut of the highly touted freshman Cheyenne Woods. Woods won back-to-back Arizona 5A Individual State Championships and was named the 2007 Arizona High School Golfer of the Year by the Arizona Republic. Despite being under the weather last week, Woods turned in a pair of solid qualifying rounds and looks poised to keep the ACC Rookie of the Year Award on campus.

"This could be one of our best team's we've ever had here," Dailey said. "We have a lot of depth. We have six players that can shoot under par anytime and it's just a matter of who is on at that time. Our reserves are playing well right now too so it should be interesting this year to see how everything plays out."

The Deacs earned an invitation to the NCAA Fall Preview by virtue of their top-10 finish at the 2008 NCAA Championships last spring. The 15-team field includes 13 of the top 15-ranked teams in Golf World's preseason poll, including the defending team champion Southern Cal.

Results and live scoring from each round of the NCAA Fall Preview can be obtained at www.Golfstat.com.