The Georgia women’s golf team will christen its 2009-10 season with a pair of two-a-days on Sunday and Monday at the Hooter’s/NGCA Match Play Championship at the LPGA International Golf Course in Daytona, Fla.

The 16-team field will play 36 holes of stroke play qualifying on Sunday. The top eight teams will then be placed in a championship bracket, with the remaining squads included in a consolation draw. Two rounds of match play will be contested on Monday, with a final round slated for Tuesday.

“It’s a lot of golf,” head coach Kelley Hester said. “It’s 108 holes (including a practice round), which is great. It’s the perfect time of year to get out and play a lot of golf.”

Georgia will travel six golfers, with sophomore Marta Silva Zamora, freshman Emilie Burger, senior Carolina Andrade and sophomore transfers Milena Savich and Kiara Hayashida occupying the No. 1-5 positions in the lineup for stroke play. Freshman Kendall Wright also will travel and will be available for potential match play action.

That’s a stark contrast to last year’s Match Play when the Bulldog roster only included five golfers, and Georgia played the match play rounds with only four golfers when senior Mallory Hetzel left to attend Qualifying School for the Duramed Futures Tour.

“It should be a lot more enjoyable to have five players in the lineup,” Hester said. “We did beat Florida with only four players last year, which was gratifying, but I feel like we’ll obviously we a lot more competitive with five golfers in the lineup instead of four.”

Hester is excited not only about the added depth but the quality of those golfers.

“We have five returnees and we’ve added five players so we have 10 players rather than six,” Hesters said. “Only two of our returning players will be among the six traveling, so that gives you an indication of the impact of the newcomers. We’ll have our two transfers – Milena and Kiara – and two of our freshmen – Emilie and Kendall. I expected all four of them to come in and contribute and they are…immediately.”

The Bulldogs were ranked No. 14 in the pre-season Golf World/NGCA Coaches poll released on Thursday.

“I think we’re a little better than that but it’s about right where most people would expect with us losing our second-best player from last season, Mallory Hetzel.

Seven of the nation’s top-15 teams in the pre-season poll are in the Match Play field, including No. 7 Alabama, No. 8 Auburn, No. 9 Virginia, No. 10 Duke, No. 11 LSU, the Bulldogs at No. 14 and No. 15 North Carolina. Rounding out the field are No. 24 Kent State, Chattanooga, Colorado, Florida, Georgia State, Ole Miss, South Carolina, TCU and UCF.

- Georgia Sports Communications