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Ziehm: Lots of drama ahead for NCAA golf tournament

The NCAA golf championship, which started in 1898, has been played in the Chicago area only four times.

Olympia Fields hosted in 1931 and 1943, North Shore in Glenview was the site in 1936, and Conway Farms in Lake Forest was the host venue in 1997. All those finals were strictly for men's teams.

Women's collegiate golf started in 1982 and never made it to Chicago for its NCAA finals. Now the men's and women's tournaments are played back-to-back at the same site and Rich Harvest Farms in Sugar Grove has the honor of hosting both tournaments next month.

The buildup for those big events starts on The Golf Channel on Thursday, when the NCAA announces the 72 teams and 24 individuals who will compete in the women's tournament. The competition begins at four regional sites - the Scarlet Course at Ohio State, the Rawls Course in Lubbock, Texas, and the school courses at Georgia and New Mexico.

Each regional gets 18 teams and six individual qualifiers, and the low six teams at each regional and the low three individuals not on those teams will advance to Rich Harvest for the finals. The women will compete there from May 19-24, and the men from May 26-31.

Conference champions get automatic invites to regional play and a selection committee determines the other qualifiers, which creates plenty of nationwide suspense for Thursday's announcement.

Coach Emily Fletcher's Northwestern team has qualified for the past four NCAA tournaments, but the Wildcats aren't automatic qualifiers this year. They were edged by Michigan State for the Big Ten title and automatic berth last weekend. NU shouldn't be worried about Thursday's announcement, however.

In the most recent Golfweek rankings of NCAA women's teams, the Wildcats were No. 11. Last year the Wildcats tied for ninth in the stroke-play portion of the finals in Washington and were one stroke short of advancing to match play, where the team title is decided. The only suspense for the Northwestern team will be in the determination of the school's regional assignment.

It won't be quite the same for Illinois, which didn't qualify for the NCAA tournament last year. The Illini showed improvement this season but struggled to a seventh-place finish in the Big Ten tournament. That showing dropped the Illini ranking from No. 29 to No. 41.

The Illini men's team, a longtime powerhouse, is a shoo-in for the NCAA tournament but will focus on the Big Ten title first. It'll begin on Friday at Baltimore Country Club. Last weekend the Illini won the Kepler Intercollegiate on Ohio State's Scarlet Course and reigning Western Amateur champion Dylan Meyer was the individual winner. Coach Mike Small's team will learn its regional assignment on May 4.

Here and there:

• Medinah's Rich Dukelow is the hottest player going into the Illinois PGA Match Play Championship, the section's first major event of the season that'll be played at Kemper Lakes from May 8-11. Dukelow teamed with Travis Johns to win the IPGA's Pro Assistant event at Ruth Lake, and then won the first stroke play event of the season, shooting a 4-under-par 68 at Weaver Ridge in Peoria on Monday.

• New Kemper Lakes head pro Jim Billiter has the same schedule conflict that he had in his previous job as an assistant at the Merit Club in Libertyville. Billiter, champion of both the IPGA Match Play and IPGA Championship in 2015, will miss the Illinois Open again. As was the case when he was at Merit Club, a major event at his club will keep Billiter out of the IPGA's biggest tournament.

• The Chicago District Golf Association will open its tournament season on Monday with a qualifier for the CDGA Mid-Amateur Championship at Village Greens of Woodridge.

• For more golf news, visit lenziehmongolf.com. Len can be contacted by email at lenziehm@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ZiehmLen and check out his posts at Facebook.com/lenziehmongolf.

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