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ORLANDO, Fla. - The fifth-ranked Bruins open up the 2015-2016 season at the ANNIKA Intercollegiate at the Reunion Resort Watson Course.
The 54-hole, three-day tournament starts on Sunday and continues through Tuesday at the par-72, 6,245 yard course located just 10 miles from Disney World. The Bruins finished ninth (+11) at last year's inaugural tournament.
The 12-team field includes the top six squads in the Golfweek preseason rankings, #1 Duke, #2 Stanford, #3 USC, #4 Arkansas and #6 Arizona. Also in the field are #10 South Carolina, #11 Texas A&M, #15 Tennessee, #16 LSU, #30 Washington and UCF.
The Bruin quintet head coach Carrie Forsyth has tabbed for the season-opening event includes senior Louise Ridderström, junior Bronte Law, sophomore Lydia Choi and freshmen Lilia Vu and Bethany Wu.
UCLA tees off on the 10th hole on Sunday (5 a.m.-5:40 a.m. PT) with Arkansas and LSU. The order is Ridderström, Choi, Wu, Law and Vu. Live scoring for the tournament can be found here.
Ridderström is coming off a junior campaign in which she averaged 74.8, posting a season-best tie for second at the Stanford Intercollegiate, firing a 6-under 207 and shooting a season-best 66 in the second round. She also tied for 26th at the NCAA Regionals (+1) and tied for 35th at Pac-12 Championships (+12), recording four Top 20 finishes and seven rounds under par.
Law, ranked third by Golfweek in the preseason player rankings, is the reigning Pac-12 Golfer of the Year, earning First Team WGCA All-America and All-Pac-12 honors a season ago. She led the conference and was ranked seventh nationally with a 71.9 stroke average. Law won twice as a sophomore at the Stanford Intercollegiate (-8, 205) and the Regional Challenge (-5, 208), finishing in the Top 10 in seven of her 12 tournaments. She tied for 29th at last year's tournament.
Choi posted a scoring average of 75.1 in 29 rounds during her freshman season, recording five under par rounds and four Top 20 finishes. Her season best was a fifth-place showing at the NCAA Regionals (-6, 210, season-best 67 in final round) to earn WGCA All-Region honors. She tied for 14th at last year's ANNIKA Intercollegiate with a trio of 72's.
Vu comes to UCLA after a successful summer that saw her qualify for the U.S. Women's Open, earning co-medalist honors with former Bruin Alison Lee. The Fountain Valley High School product and two-time AJGA All-America won the 2014 CIF-WSCGA Championship and tied for eighth in stroke play at the 2014 U.S. Girls Junior Championship.
Wu (Diamond Bar, Calif.) had a busy summer, finishing in the Top 4 in three amateur tournaments and finishing the year first in the Golfweek junior rankings. She reached the semifinals of the U.S. Women's Amateur, was second at the Women's North and South Amateur and placed second at the Canadian Women's Amateur Championship.
In off the course news, UCLA women's golf won the highest team grade point average award for the third straight season, as announced at Wednesday's Welcome Back Picnic.