University Star

Four members of Texas State women’s golf team travelled to Turkey from Sept. 27 to Sept. 30 to represent their countries in one of the biggest international golf competitions in the world.

Women’s golf members Krista Puisite, Mara Puisite, Valdis Jonsdottir and Iman Nordin participated in the Gloria Golf Club tournament in Antalya, Turkey for the World Amateur Golf Championship.

The competition brought together some of the best amateur women golfers in 56 countries.

Senior Krista Puisite and her sister, junior Mara Puisite, represented their home country of Latvia in the competition. The Puisite sisters said they did not expect Latvia to do well. However, Latvia maintained a strong rank, finishing 21st after the four days of the tournament.

“This time we played well for Latvia,” Krista Puisite said. “Seeing all those other countries below ours made it really nice to see us high up on the scoreboard.”

Each country sends three of its best golfers to the competition. Despite the tough opposition, the Puisite sisters and the Latvian team scored early and managed to grab second place on the leaderboards after the first day.

 Mara Puisite was quick to point out “Latvia is not very big on golf” and “has not always performed so strongly in the past.”

“It was just great to get to play there,” Mara Puisite said. “We don’t have too many golfers in Latvia, so the competition was more of a mental challenge for me.”

Both sisters put forth strong individual performances. Krista Puisite managed to secure a rank of 22 out of 168 different players. Mara ranked 98th overall.

Nordin, representing Malaysia, ranked 82nd and Jonsdottir represented Iceland and finished in a 100th place tie.

Ultimately, both girls, along with the Latvian team, managed a stronger-than-usual performance for their home country in one of the biggest international golf competitions in the world. The Bobcats’ next tournament as a team is Oct. 15-17 at the Oklahoma University Invitational.

Twitter: @EddieBatyIII