USC women’s golf hopes to lead a charmed weekend

By BOB GILLESPIE - bgillespie@thestate.com

For her first NCAA post-season trip as South Carolina’s women’s golf coach this week, Kalen Anderson is taking along a couple of good-luck charms.

As the Gamecocks travel to Athens, Ga., and the NCAA East Regional, they will be chauffeured by Rudy Spry, aka “Rudy the bus driver,” whose heroics last year when a blowout sent the USC men’s team’s bus careening off I-95 earned him honorary membership on both Gamecocks squads.

“He took (the USC women’s team) to the SEC Championship, and we did well (a fifth-place finish),” Anderson said.

More conventional — and likely more crucial to the Gamecocks’ chances — will be Benedicte Toumpsin.

USC, seeded 11th in the 21-team regional, needs all the luck it can get. The top nine teams at the regional will advance to the NCAA Championship in Albuquerque, N.M., May 20-23.

That means the Gamecocks have to exceed the NCAA’s expectations of them, something Anderson is counting on.

“Any time you go to a regional, everyone is going to play their best,” Anderson said. “I’ve seen it over and over” as an assistant coach at three-time defending national champion Duke, before taking over the USC team at mid-season.

“I think we have a good shot to get through the regional,” she said. “I have high expectations; we need to build off our SEC performance and see what happens. But we’ve got to do better than expected.”

That will be difficult in the loaded East. Besides No. 1 seed Duke, the field includes five SEC teams — No. 2 Florida, No. 3 Georgia and No. 4 Auburn, plus Tennessee and Vanderbilt — seeded ahead of USC.

Southern Conference champion Furman is seeded 12th in the East, while Charleston Southern of the Big South is 20th. College of Charleston’s Steffi Kirchmayr and Coastal Carolina’s Araceli Felgueroso will compete as individuals in the Central Regional at Austin, Texas.

Vital to USC’s chances will be Toumpsin, a sophomore from Belgium who was the Gamecocks’ top finisher in eight of nine tournaments.

Toumpsin has four top-five finishes for USC and her 74.07 stroke average is three shots better than any of her teammates.

“Benedicte finishing third at the SEC was great,” Anderson said. “And (sophomore) Taylor Barrett had a good SEC, too, finishing 14th with a (team-best) 71 the final round.”

Being familiar with the UGA course is an advantage for USC, Anderson said. So should be the 29-year-old coach’s experience in NCAA play.

“The stakes go up, sure, but you have to treat it as just another tournament,” she said. “My style is (that) there’s enough at stake, so just be relaxed and play golf.”

A little luck wouldn’t hurt, either.

Reach senior writer Bob Gillespie at (803) 771-8304.