PALM COAST, Fla. --- Coming into the 2018-19 year, the Biola Women's Golf team knew it had the depth and talent to have a special season. The Eagles certainly finished the fall portion of their season with a bang on Wednesday, winning the team and individual titles at the NCCAA National Championships in Palm Coast, Florida.

Head Coach Jane Carr's group shot a tournament-best 309 on Wednesday to win the first National Championship in program history while freshman Sami Penor shot a 76 and won the first playoff hole to earn top medalist honors over Campbellsville's Kylie Withrow.

All five Eagles played superb during their final playthrough at the Hammock Beach Resort Conservatory course, with each student-athlete carding an 80 or under to finish in the top-fourth of third round scores.

Biola started the day with only a three-stroke lead over second place Erskine College, but an Eagles team paced on the front nine by junior Jules Loibl increased that margin to 11 strokes when BU finished the first half of its round at +9. Loibl started her day by sinking a birdie on hole 11 and stayed just one-over through 10 holes, setting herself up to climb nine spots on the final day and finish in 13th place.

The rest of Loibl's teammates finished in the top-10 of the leaderboard as the Eagles stayed steady over their final nine holes to double their lead over the trailing Flying Fleet and win the championship by a big margin.

Penor and Tori Roeske had particularly good second halves to their day, shooting one-over and two-over, respectively over their last nine holes. But Alexis Gopfert and Sophia Karnazes also followed up their great performances on the back nine by recording par on at least five holes each in the final stretch. Gopfert would finish ninth and Karnazes seventh to make it three-straight top-10 finishes for both women.

Roeske also earned that accomplishment by using birdies on two and four to finish with a 235. But it took Penor an extra hole to earn sole possession of the individual title, following her three-round score of 229 with a victory on the first playoff hole that came after sinking a three-foot putt.

All four top-10 finishers earned NCCAA All-American honors for Biola while Head Coach Jane Carr was recognized as the NCCAA Coach of the Year. That makes two national NCCAA honors for the junior Tori Roeske, who was given an NCCAA scholar-athlete award earlier in the week along with fellow junior Bella Larson. 

This marks the fourth NCCAA National Championship for Biola University since Biola joined the association last year and the first of the 2018-19 athletic year.