Women’s Golf

The season has already started as the Fresno City College women’s golf team gears for a repeat as Central Valley Conference champions.

Since their formation in 1995 under now Athletic Director Susan Yates, the Rams have been familiar faces atop the conference food chain. When head coach Rhonda Williams took over in 1999, she kept the Rams on the winning track.

FCC captured four consecutive conference titles spanning from the 2004-2007 seasons. The Rams came just short in 2008 from making it five consecutive years, finishing in second place. Their time off the top didn’t last long however as the Rams once again captured the conference title last season.

This season, the Rams are once again in the lead for conference play. Canada College is right on their heels in a close second, a race for the conference title that Williams sees playing out the entire season.

“They’re the ones we’ve been close with score wise,” Williams said. “Not to say that some other teams couldn’t be right there, but it has been a battle with us and Canada playing for that first and second place in each conference match.”

In women’s golf, each team meets up in a conference match about once per week. When they play in these matches, the teams play six players and after the match, they will take the four lowest scores from those six players and add them up. The team that comes out with the victory will then receive five points.

With only two players returning to the 2010 squad, coach Williams wasn’t sure what to expect from this team initially.

“It was kind of hard to have certain expectations, because four of our six players were brand new,” Williams said. “After the first couple of conference matches, it’s good to see that we’re right in there battling for first place.”

Sophomores Laura Andrews and Lauren Marlow have been the anchors of this young team. Williams explained how their leadership on the links has helped the others.

“Lauren and Laura have been real steady players for us so far,” Williams said. “They’re playing in the No.1 and two spots for us. They’ve done a great job helping the rest of the ladies come along and show them what to expect [in the matches].”

Coach Williams also credits the play of the four freshmen on the team. Williams explains that the play of those four has improved over each tournament so far and believes it has to do with the amount of work they put in their down time.

“They work hard at practice, they put a lot of time into their game. They’re getting better and better all the time. That’s what I like to see on a daily and weekly basis.”

Returning player Laura Andrews, explained what her expectations were for this team coming off a 2009 CVC title.

“Our goal is to win the Central Valley Conference title, go to Nor-Cal and we’d like to win the State [championship],” Andrews said. “I think we have done great so far, I think we’ve gelled well as a team and our expectations are to continue to play well and improve our scores as the season goes along.”

The Rams just finished up the Sutterton Invitational on Sept. 30 and the North/South Invitational on Oct. 3 and 4. Results from those matches were unavailable by the time of press. The Rams continue CVC play on Oct. 7 out at Kings River Country Club, before playing their next CVC match on Oct. 12 at Riverbend Golf Course.

Women’s Soccer

The Fresno City College women’s soccer team traveled down to Aptos on Oct. 1 to take on Cabrillo and the Rams came away with a 5-0 victory.

All of FCC’s victories this season have come by way of shutout. Women’s soccer coach Oliver Germond explains that it’s the attitude of the entire team that allows them to complete victories by shutout.

“The thing that stands out for me is that we haven’t given up very many quality chances for other teams to score,” Germond said. “That’s what really excites me about this team. If we can get a little better with our finishing and combine those two, who knows how far we can get with that.”

Against Cabrillo, the Rams offense was clicking on all cylinders. Led by Jesslyn Fagundes 2 goals, the Rams added goals from Paige Mason, Marissa Pacheco and Susel Perez to finish off the game. Perez also had three assists in the game.

FCC swapped three goalies during the match with Stephanie Winnenger seeing the majority of the time playing 60 minutes, while reserves Tegan Coltra and Tiffany Longcor each played 15 minutes.

The Rams are now 8-2-1 on the season with 9 games remaining in the regular season. FCC will start their conference play on Oct. 12 against College of Sequoias in Visalia.

The Rams will then travel to Taft on Oct. 15 in another CVC match before heading into the following week hosting West Hills on Oct. 19.