The Cardinal made a hard push in the final round, but it proved too little too late. Despite shooting +16 as a team yesterday — good for sixth on the day — the No. 24 women’s golf team could not overcome earlier setbacks and a tough field at the Arizona Wildcat Invitational in Tucson, finishing in a tie for ninth place with No. 7 Auburn.

“I feel the team performed well this week. We got off to a rough start, but we had a great finishing day,” said junior Mari Chun.

“I felt like the team struggled on our finishing holes, but a lot of the time we played solid golf and made good decisions,” said freshman Piper Miller.

The tournament had a promising start for the Cardinal. The team shot +19 for the tournament, but the competition was fierce — of the 16 schools partaking in the tournament, six were ranked in top-10, including the top four teams in the country. As a result, despite its respectable score, Stanford finished the first round in 11th place.

Chun was the day one leader for the Cardinal: she finished at a remarkable -2 on the day, good for second place in the individual standings. Miller and sophomore Angela King both shot +6, while the final two Stanford participants, freshman Rebecca Durham and junior Ki-Shui Liao, scored +9 and +11 respectively.

The Cardinal looked to build on its early success in Tuesday’s second round, but the team’s overall score shot up to +30, although, interestingly enough, the team moved up a slot to stand in tenth place. It was an off day for all the top schools involved, as all of the teams in the top-10 finished with lower scores than on the first day. However, Stanford was not able to capitalize fully on the opportunity.

Both Chun and Miller said that weather and its subsequent effect on the course contributed to the higher second day score.

“Conditions were tough this week, and there were not very many under-par rounds, so minimizing mistakes was essential to playing well on this course,” said Chun.

“We had difficult weather conditions the last two days of the tournament,” said Miller.

Still, the team had some strong performances: Durham led the Cardinal at four-over-par on the day, and Chun shot six-over — although a solid score, she fell from second to sixth in the individual rankings.

By the end of the second day, it became evident that Stanford had little chance of finishing in the top-five — No. 3 Arizona State, who stood in fifth after the second round, was still 14 shots up on the Cardinal. However, Stanford still had a shot at finishing in the top-10, despite being one of the lowest ranked teams in the field.

On Wednesday, that’s exactly what they did.

The women’s +16 team finish was their best of the tournament, bested only by the likes of No. 15 Oklahoma State, the Invitational’s eventual winner; No. 4 USC and No. 2 Duke, who tied for second; the Sun Devils, who led the tournament after day one; and UCLA, the No. 1 team in the country.

The Cowgirls won by two shots, despite a fierce challenge from the Blue Devils — who shot a round-low +6 — and the Trojans. The rest of the field was distant from the top three schools: Arizona, the fourth place finisher, ended 13 shots behind Duke and USC.

Chun and Durham led the Cardinal at two-over-par, but the rest of the team wasn’t far behind: Miller shot +5, and King and Liao both finished the round at +7 on the day.

Durham’s overall +14 score for the tournament was the lowest score of her career.

Chun finished in fourth place in the individual standings, at +6 overall. She finished six shots behind the leader, Amanda Blumenherst of Duke.

Chun’s finish was her best of the season, and her third top-10 finish of the year.

“I felt like our team did a great job persevering each day,” said Miller. “We all still kept trying to play our best and make shots happen, no matter how frustrating it was at times.”

Stanford will not compete for another month and a half, which leaves extra time for practice.

“I am looking forward to fine tuning my game, so I can contribute more to the team,” said Chun.

The Cardinal will return to the desert on April 4 for its next tournament, the Arizona State Invitational.