Stanford, USC women have sights on epic NCAA showdown, and Eastern Michigan counts its blessings after magical run

The extraordinary run by the Eastern Michigan women’s golf team came to an end on Tuesday in the NCAA Division I Championships, but not before the Eagles beat one last powerhouse on their way out. And as for Wednesday’s match-play finalists, they could have not been more predictable.

EMU, which had never been to a regional before this year and made the final eight with 72 strong holes of stroke play at the Omni La Costa Resort & Spa, bounced the Texas Longhorns from the competition on Tuesday morning with a 3½-1½ win. It gave the Eagles an afternoon shot in the semifinals at the nation’s No. 1 team, Stanford, and it was there that the dream of a fairy tale run to the title ended in a 5-0 rout produced the Cardinal.

In what should be a compelling final between West Coast schools in Carlsbad, Calif., Stanford will take on No. 2 ranked USC, which edged Arkansas 3-2.

Stanford will make its third straight appearance in the final after winning in 2024 and losing last year. The Cardinal have been the dominant team of the match-play era that began in 2015, winning three times and finishing runner-up twice. Meantime, USC will play its second match-play final, with the Trojans having lost to Wake Forest in 2023.

USC’s three national titles came during the stroke-play era, and each team is vying for a fourth national title, with the winner moving into third for all-time wins behind Arizona State (8) and Duke (7).

Stanford coach Anne Walker called the showdown “must-watch TV.”

“They [USC] have so many great players. You think of Catherine Park and what a great leader she had been for them, and we have Megha Ganne and Kelly [Xu]. I am certain it’ll go down to the wire. It’ll be a battle all the way.”

Stanford earned the top seed for match play when it shot 22 under over four rounds on the North Course, and USC finished second, 13 strokes back. For the season, the Cardinal, playing in the ACC, have eight stroke-play and four match-play victories, while the Trojans, of the Big Ten, have won eight times in stroke play and four times in match play.

The Cardinal have some of the college game’s more recognizable stars, with all five of its players in the top 17 of the World Amateur Golf Rankings—Paula Martin Sampedro, Andrea Revuelta, Meja Ortengren, Ganne and Xu. USC counters with Jasmine Koo and Catherine Park, who are in the top 20.

In the lead match that may set the pace, Sampedro will take on Park, and if comes down to the anchor pairing, that one is Ganne versus Bailey Shoemaker. USC’s Ellise Lee, who won the national title last year with Northwestern, draws maybe the toughest opponent in Match 3, going against Xu, who is tied for career match-play victories with seven.

“What got us through the day was what has led to our success this season: our depth,” USC coach Justin Silverstein said. “We have been led by Catherine Park and Jasmine Koo for most of the season, but the rest of the team has stepped up and put up huge rounds when we needed them to. We look forward to another huge challenge tomorrow.”

USC beat Duke in the morning quarters, but it came down to Trojan Kylie Chong winning her match late. Just as in the afternoon, Stanford opened the day with a 5-0 defeat of Pepperdine.

After last year’s finals lost to underdog Northwestern, Stanford had to be wary of upstart Eastern Michigan, which had been led for the week by a pair of twins, Jasmine and Janae Leoveo, who were raised just a few miles north of La Costa. But the Cardinal showed few nerves in winning for of the five matches before they reached the 18th hole.

For EMU, it was the end of a remarkable season in which the program rose from almost complete anonymity to proving it could compete with the best teams in the country. The Eagles finished fifth among the final teams in stroke play, and less than 24 hours after that, they had beaten fourth-seeded Texas. Easily the biggest highight for EMU in the morning was 

"This tournament is exhausting. It's been a long week. I'm okay in the fact we got beaten by a team that, on paper, is better than us, so I can live with that,” EMU coach Josh Brewer said. “ It’s disappointing, but it's one of those things that 20 years from now, when you walk through the university and there's a picture of us up there holding a semifinal trophy in women's golf, you know it's pretty special. You'd like to think you might be holding a different trophy, but at the end of the day, it might be as good as it ever gets. So, you just got to enjoy it.”