SUGAR GROVE, Ill. (May 18, 2017) -- FIU Senior Camila Serrano gets what most student-athletes never get. The knowledge that she is playing in her last event of her career. Serrano tees off Friday at the NCAA Division I Women's Golf National Championships in Sugar Grove, Illinois. The six-day event will crown an individual champion and a team championship at Rich Harvest Farms, a par-72, 6,343-yard final test in Division I golf.
 
By virtue of her 4-over finish in the NCAA Columbus Regional nine days ago, Serrano was tied for seventh in the 96-golfer field and one of three individuals advancing from Columbus to Illinois. The NCAA invited 12 individuals from the four regionals combined to participate in the penultimate golf tournament, and Serrano is the third FIU individual ever to play in the Division I National Championship. The usual stresses of academics are lifted for this event, as Serrano graduated several weeks ago with a degree in international business.
 
The tournament also includes 24 teams that advanced from regional competition. Action starts on Friday with three days of 18-hole stroke play. Following the first three rounds, the field is then cut to the top 15 teams and nine individuals not on an advancing team for the final round of stroke play. Following that fourth round, the individual champion will be crowned and the field will be cut to the top eight teams which advance to match play. The quarterfinals and semifinals will take place on Tuesday, May 23, followed by the championship match on Wednesday, May 24. 
 
Serrano will tee off from the first hole Friday afternoon, at 1:55 p.m. and the 10^th hole on Saturday morning at 9:25 a.m. as the championship aims to move around the golfers for the first two rounds for fairness. The third round will have tee times set by position on the leaderboard before the cuts. Monday's round will determine the individual champion after 72 holes. 
 
"She is playing as well as she has played all year," said FIU Head Coach Joe Vogel. "I think the Columbus Regional was the hardest one of the four and she played extremely well there. I like her game right now."
 
Following her NCAA Regional finish, Serrano, the Conference USA Women's Golfer of the Year, moved up from her regular-season ranking of 81^st to 53^rd in Division I women's golf. She was 746-91 in 11 tournaments this season. On the year, Serrano posted four top-five finishes and a total of eight in the top 10, including a tie for ninth at the C-USA Championships at the start of May. Her stroke average is a 72.65, the best of her career by more than a stroke.
 
She also earned First-Team All-C-USA honors for her outstanding season. She is a four-time all-conference selection and the third-straight Golfer of the Year from FIU. Serrano took home a league-best four Golfer of the Week honors this season and was the 2014 C-USA Women's Golf Freshman of the Year.
 
Live links are available at FIUSports.com to follow her progress through the first three rounds and possibly into the final round Monday.
 
FIUSports.com visited with Head Coach Joe Vogel and Serrano during a practice round in Miami on Tuesday morning. Hear their thoughts by clicking the video link.

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About FIU Athletics: FIU Athletics is home to more than 400 student-athletes in 18 different sports. Athletic events are played in eight different venues on FIU's campuses (Modesto A. Maidique and Biscayne Bay), including Lime Court at FIU Arena and Riccardo Silva Stadium.
 
About FIU: Florida International University is classified by Carnegie as a "R1: Doctoral Universities - Highest Research Activity" and recognized as a Carnegie Community Engaged university. It is a public research university with colleges and schools that offers bachelor's, master's and doctoral programs in fields such as business, engineering, computer science, international relations, architecture, law and medicine. As one of South Florida's anchor institutions, FIU contributes almost $9 billion each year to the local economy and is ranked second in Florida in Forbes Magazine's "America's Best Employers" list. FIU graduates are consistently among the highest paid college graduates in Florida and are among the leaders of public and private organizations throughout South Florida. FIU is Worlds Ahead in finding solutions to the most challenging problems of our time. FIU emphasizes research as a major component of its mission with multiple state-of-the-art research facilities including the Wall of Wind Research and Testing Facility, FIU's Medina Aquarius Program and the Advanced Materials Engineering Research Institute.  FIU has awarded more than 220,000 degrees and enrolls more than 54,000 students in two campuses and centers including FIU Downtown on Brickell, FIU@I-75, the Miami Beach Urban Studios, and Tianjin, China. FIU also supports artistic and cultural engagement through its three museums: Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, the Wolfsonian-FIU, and the Jewish Museum of Florida-FIU. FIU is a member of Conference USA and more than 400 student-athletes participating in 18 sports. For more information about FIU, visit http://www.fiu.edu/.