SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Brianna Navarrosa beat the world’s top-ranked amateur, Rose Zhang, and Southern California knocked off reigning champion Stanford 3-1 in the NCAA women’s golf semifinals on Tuesday.
In the other semifinal, Wake Forest beat Texas A&M 3-0 to earn its second trip to the national final.
Zhang capped off one of the greatest runs in NCAA history on Monday, becoming the first woman to win multiple national championships in golf with her second straight individual title. The sophomore who turns 20 on Wednesday matched former Arizona golfer and LPGA Hall of Famer Lorena Ochoa’s records of eight wins in a season and 12 for her career.
Zhang also won the Augusta National Women’s Amateur in April.
But Zhang and Stanford ran into trouble in the semifinals against USC. Christine Wang beat Brooke Seay 2 and 1 and Cindy Kou beat Stanford’s Megha Ganne by the same score. Freshman Kelly Xu got Stanford on the board with a 2-and-1 win over national co-runner-up Catherine Park.
With Sadie Englemann 2 up through 16 holes against Amari Avery, Stanford needed Zhang to rally from a 2-down deficit over the final four holes at Grayhawk Golf Club.
Navarrosa didn’t give the individual champion a chance, dropping a birdie putt after Zhang hit it close on the par-3 16th and closing out her 2 and 1 victory with a par on 17.
Stanford beat Pepperdine 3-1 in the quarterfinals Tuesday morning and USC beat South Carolina by the same score.
Zhang led off Stanford’s quarterfinal matches with a 6-and-5 win over Reese Guzman, but wasn’t quite as sharp in the afternoon anchor match.
She lost the opening hole with a double bogey and was 3 down at the turn after hitting into a fairway bunker. Zhang sank a long birdie putt on No. 14 to get within 2 down, but Navarrosa matched her down the stretch to send the Demon Deacons to the title match.
Wake Forest, the national runner-up in 2019, won a school-record five tournaments this season and beat Florida State 3-1 in the morning quarterfinals.
Emilia Migliaccio holed out for eagle on the par-4 sixth on her way to beating Texas A&M’s Zoe Slaughter 2 and 1 in the afternoon’s first match.
Rachel Kuehn, the two-time ACC player of the year, beat Texas A&M’s Hailee Cooper 4 and 2.
Mimi Rhodes took a 1-up lead on Blanca Fernandez Garcia-Poggio with a par on the par-3 13th and they traded pars over the next four holes. Rhodes clinched Wake Forest’s spot in the title match after Garcia-Poggio hit into a greenside bunker and missed a short birdie putt on the par-5 18th.
This story originally appeared on ESPN
