SCHENECTADY, N.Y. – The Union College women's golf team looks to keep up its late-season momentum with a good showing at the 2026 Liberty League Women's Golf Championships, to be held on Friday and Saturday at Teugega Country Club in Rome. The two-day event tees off on Friday at 12:00 p.m., followed by a noon tee-off again on Saturday.
Last season, Union took fourth place out of seven squads at the Liberty League Championship, posting rounds of 332 and 323 at Pinehaven Country Club to achieve its highest-ever finish in a full conference field. Wellesley College held off New York University to capture the conference title with a two-day score of 612, six strokes ahead of NYU and 39 strokes clear of third-place Ithaca College (651).
Union enters the weekend averaging 344.07 strokes per round this season, a mark that would rank third on the school's all-time list. However, the squad has seen improvement over the course of the spring, averaging under 340 strokes per round in three spring events and posting its second-lowest round of the season and 10th lowest in program history with a 328 on Saturday at the Union Spring Invitational.
Sophomore
Iyene Essien has been a steady presence at the top of the Union lineup this season, averaging 76.79 strokes per round with four individual medalist honors and seven top-five finishes - her only finish outside the top-four came at the Great Danes Invitational, where she finished 16th in a field of Division I competitors. She looks for a similar performance to the one that earned her All-Liberty League first-team honors a year ago with a two-day score of 153. Essien has posted seven of the top-11 single-round scores in program history this season, as well as three of the top-nine two-day scores ever for a Union golfer.
Senior
Shea White ranks second on the team by averaging 84.67 strokes per round and has two top-five and five top-10 finishes to her credit in seven events this year. She matched the low round of her career with a 79 at the St. Lawrence Fall Invitational and has the team's three lowest rounds of the year not carded by Essien so far in 2025-26. Her career scoring average of 86.83 currently ranks fourth-best all-time at the school.
Sophomore
Carinna Anastasio has also been a consistent scorer for Union this season and ranks third on the squad with a scoring average of 88.00 strokes per round this year. She has carded five straight rounds in the 80s so far during the spring season, including a season-best 81 at the Martin/Wallace Invitational in mid-April and an 82 last weekend at the Union Spring Invitational. On the year, she has five top-10 finishes in eight events.
Sophomore
Ella Golas and first-year
Emma Doherty will round out Union's quintet this weekend. Doherty is averaging 95.86 strokes per round this season, while Golas is right behind her with a 96.36 average.
