DELAND, Fla. (April 13, 2009) - The ETSU women's golf team began the defense of its 2008 Atlantic Sun Conference championship Monday afternoon at the Victoria Hills Golf Club, firing a first round score of 301 to finish in third place.

            The Buccaneers are just three strokes behind leader and host school Stetson, while Campbell sits in second place, just one stroke ahead of ETSU. On the individual leaderboard, Stetson's Danielle Jackson posted a 1-under-par 71 to hold a one-stroke advantage over both ETSU sophomore Sinead O'Sullivan (Galway, Ireland) and Campbell's Belen Diaz Cisneros.

            "We looked very tentative for the first seven holes today, almost like we were thinking about defending the title and not just focused on playing our game," said ETSU head coach Stefanie Shelton. "But after that we really turned it around on the back nine and posted some scores, so I was really proud to see the girls rally like that. The course setup has certainly given Stetson an advantage because they are the host school. We just have to adjust to that, and we have two days to turn it completely around."

            O'Sullivan is not the only ETSU woman in contention, as freshman Nina Muehl (Vienna, Austria) fired a 2-over-par 74 to tie for fifth and is just three strokes out of the lead. Meanwhile, senior Lucy Gould (Bargoed, Wales) is tied for 16^th and junior Kennie Leigh Eisenhower (Newport) is tied for 25^th. ETSU senior Laura Jansone (Jurmala, Latvia), the defending A-Sun individual champion, had an uncharacteristic round with a 79 to tie for 27^th.

            Second and third round action will continue on Tuesday and Wednesday, with live scoring and results available at Golfstat.com. A full wrap up of the day's action will also be available at the end of each round on ETSUBucs.com.