The ISU women’s golf team will be spending most of its Spring Break in sunny Phoenix. The No. 11 Cyclones are there to compete in the Triangular Match, their first tournament since their season-worst performance at the SunTrust Gator Invitational.

They tied for sixth out of 17 teams, which snapped their season long streak of top-5 finishes, but more importantly served as extra motivation.

“They are definitely very motivated right now,” said ISU coach Christie Martens. “We know we could have done better in Florida. They are very motivated to go out and show that they can play much better.”

The Cyclones couldn’t have asked for a better start to their spring season. They narrowly lost a close battle for a tournament win to No. 1 Alabama in Puerto Rico. They later beat No. 4 LSU by nine strokes, and the defending national champions, Purdue, by 16 strokes. So when they entered last week’s SunTrust Invitational ranked No. 11 — the top-ranked team in attendance — and finished sixth, the team was disappointed.

“We didn’t play very well,” said freshman Prima Thammaraks. “You really had to know the greens on that course, really know them. We had a lot of putts coming close but just not rolling in the hole. But that’s not why we lost, we could have played better.”

The Cyclones are using the tournament as a wake up call.

“I think it was good for us to see what can happen if we even let down a little,” Martens said. “Everyone is really pumped up this week to practice hard and be ready to go. I think everyone is very excited to go out and play their best golf this tournament.”

Thammaraks echoed her coach.

“I feel like sometimes when you get up there it can be easy to think ‘oh it’s because you’re that good.’ But really, it’s always about keep improving,” Thammaraks said.

The Cyclones have played on the course that hosts the Triangular Match before and the weather forecast is beautiful.

“It’s a very scoreable course,” Martens said. “It has some nice par-3s, good hazards, it should suit us well. Again it’s very scoreable, and there will be good teams there that can put up some really low scores. We’re excited for it.”

The first round tees off Tuesday with the second round being played later in the afternoon. The final 18 will be played Wednesday.