April 19, 2003

“Friday night, we went to the SEC Banquet and I was surprised last night when my name was called for SEC Player of the Year. I wasn’t really expecting it this year. There were so many of us that were in the running that I just didn’t know. It was a nice surprise and something that I have worked hard for over the last four years. I understand that the voting was really close over the last couple of years and this year was tighter than I wanted it to be.

It was really special that seven of my family members were able to make the banquet. When they called me up to the podium to accept the trophy, the entire room gave me a standing ovation. It was really nice to win the award and to see that so many of the girls were pulling for me.

Violeta Retamoza from Tennessee won the SEC Freshman of the Year award and I played with her for the first time today. She’s a really solid player and doesn’t make a lot of mistakes. She played well again today and made some putts. I was surprised to get in and see that I was only one stroke back of her today. I thought that she was playing a lot better than I was today. She’s only one stroke back of me for the tournament so tomorrow will be fun.

“It was a struggle for me today out there today. I was hitting it close early but it wasn’t until hole number six that I got my first birdie. I hit some good shots today but I didn’t play as well as I did yesterday. I came out this morning wanting to make some more putts and I think I did that. I had four birdies and three bogeys today so it wasn’t really exciting. But, it was good to struggle and shoot 71. It could have been worse.

The wind yesterday was a lot different today. Yesterday was calm but today the wind made you think on a few shots and made a few shots a little tougher.

I think our team confidence is still there. We need to just go out and play our game and hit one shot at a time. We’ll go out and try to hit a lot of birdies tomorrow, post a low score and see where we stand. We identified where our mistakes where today and no one has given up. There’s no “give up” on our team and that’s one thing I love about every single player on our team. Even though we are 11 back, we’re still in the middle of it.”