Golfers In 9th At NCAA West Regional
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DALY CITY, Calif. - The University of Colorado men's golf team had it under par on the front nine, but struggled on the first four holes on the back side before a late rally saw the Buffaloes settle in a ninth place tie after the first round of the NCAA West Regional here Thursday.
No. 14 Arizona State shot a 9-under par 279 team score, one better than No. 37 New Mexico to possess the lead through 18 holes. No. 12 Texas A & M was two back in third place at 281, with No. 35 Oregon fourth (282) and No. 2 Southern California currently in the fifth and final qualifying position for the finals later this month (285).
Colorado, ranked No. 39 by Golfweek (and No. 43 by GolfStat) is tied with host San Francisco for ninth place with 3-over par 291 scores. The Buffs made the turn at 4-under, but collectively played the first four holes on the back at 10-over; CU got a reprieve late when its senior stars finished their last four holes at 5-under.
Junior Luke Symons posted the best round by a Buffalo, carding a 2-under 70 on the 6,849-yard, par-72 Lake Merced Golf Club course layout, which is located just southwest of San Francisco. He was 4-under after a 32 on the front nine and is tied for 11th place through one round.
Symons worst round statistically all season has been the first, averaging 75.3 strokes per prior to Thursday's effort, his second best opening 18 score in 13 tournaments this year. He was fairly consistent with five birdies, 10 pars and three bogeys, while hitting 10 fairways and 13 greens with 30 putts. But he didn't enter this tournament keying on improving his first round score.
"Not really," he answered when queried about the latter. "I knew that on this type of course you just have to keep it in play, and I thought I did that pretty well all day. That gave me an opportunity to have some good birdie putts. I have been struggling with driving the ball and keeping it in play all spring. I find I play my best when I hit it well off the tee, and I hit my driver great today. I feel more confident about my whole game, especially when you get on some of these tees with really tight fairways."
CU's standout senior duo of Patrick Grady and Derek Tolan stood a combined 6-over par with four holes to play, but closed strong to rally the Buffaloes overall as a team closer to the leaders. Both had their fair share of misfortune up to that point, including a lost ball by Tolan on the par-4 No. 7; it got stuck in a tree and fell to the ground when the next group passed through, long after he had taken the penalty and played a second ball, eventually scoring a double bogey.
Grady birdied No. 15 when he drained a 60-foot putt, and came back with eagle on No. 16, chipping it in on the par-4 hole when all he was trying to do was get it in position to make a four; he finished with an even par 72 and is tied for 20th. Tolan birdied his last two, nearly holing out on 18 when he chipped out of the sand trap, to close out at 1-over par 73 and to tie for 37th. Both scored 12 pars and had 30 putts on their rounds, with Grady scoring an eagle, two birdies, two bogeys and a double while Tolan had three birdies, two bogeys and the one double.
"Things are still pretty wide open, there's no real separation yet with 10 teams within 12 shots of each other," head coach Roy Edwards said. "I'm really happy with the way we finished. It wasn't Pat's and Derek's best day, but they did a pretty good job of managing their rounds and finished strong, but Luke played solid. We took a pretty high fourth score compared to the field which hurt us, but overall we're right there.
"I expect us to come out tomorrow and get right into the thick of things. There should be some separation after the second round is all said and done."
The two CU freshmen competing here weren't pleased with their scores, though historically they fared better than almost all previous Buff frosh in their first NCAA championship round.
Johnny Widmer and Kevin Kring both turned at even par, but played the back nine at 4- and 5-over, respectively, to post scores of 76 and 77. The best effort by a freshman came in the 1999 Central Regional, when Matt Zions scored a 2-over 74 on Ohio State's Scarlet course; Widmer matched the second best efforts, 76s by Mike Hogberg (1981 in Palo Alto) and Kane Webber (2000 in Victoria, Texas). Eleven CU players have now competed as freshmen in the NCAA's.
Kring was frustrated that he took 35 putts (Widmer had 30), scoring two birdies, nine pars and seven bogeys for his round, while Widmer had two birdies, 11 pars, four bogeys and one double.
Southern Cal sophomore Matthew Giles shot a 7-under 65, which included a bogey on his last hole when he had a chance to tie the course record, good for a one shot lead over Arizona State's Jesper Kennegard. In all, 19 players bettered par with another 17 equaling it in the 75-man field, without a single score recorded in the 80s. Of the six regional courses in play Thursday, only the Southeast in Sorrento, Fla., had more favorable scoring than the West.
The field mainly took advantage of the par-5s, with 27 golfers playing the four at 3-under or better; only seven players were under par collectively on the par-3s (including CU's Grady at 1-under), and just 10 going into the red on the par-4s.
"I was disappointed that we didn't take advantage of some holes that we should have, but everything is so tightly bunched so there aren't any gaps," Edwards said. "If we play good tomorrow, we could very well be in the top five, but that wouldn't change anything for the final round. The five who will go on will have to play their best Saturday.
"We just have to stay patient, the guys are ready to go," he continued. "I think more than anything today they did a fairly good job of managing things when they were playing poorly. We need to open the second round like we closed the first, and that would give us some momentum right off the bat. And that would contagious."
The second round is set for Friday, with the Buffaloes to be paired with San Diego and UC-Irvine, the first tee time of the threesomes at 10:10 a.m. PST. The third round is Saturday, with the top five teams (and top individual from a non-advancing school) to advance to the 112th NCAA Championships in Toledo from May 26-30.
BUFFALO INDIVIDUALS
T11. Luke Symons.................................. 32-38?70
T20. Patrick Grady.................................. 36-36?72
T37. Derek Tolan.................................... 39-34?73
T60. Johnny Widmer................................ 36-40?76
T67. Kevin Kring..................................... 36-41?77
TOP 5 INDIVIDUALS
1. Matthew Giles, USC......................... 32-33?65
2. Jesper Kennegard, Arizona State........ 35-31?66
3. John Hurley, Texas A&M................... 35-32?67
3. Brady Johnson. BYU......................... 33-34?67
3. Steve Saunders, New Mexico............ 35-32?67
TEAM SCORES
1. Arizona State.............................. 279
2. New Mexico................................ 280
3. Texas A&M................................. 281
4. Oregon....................................... 282
5. Southern California...................... 285
6. San Diego State.......................... 286
7. San Diego................................... 288
8. UC-Irvine.................................... 289
9. COLORADO............................... 291
9. San Francisco............................. 291
11. Kansas State.............................. 294
12. UC-Davis.................................... 298
13. Oregon State............................... 300
2009 NCAA WEST REGIONAL NOTES
u Senior Derek Tolan became just the fifth CU player to have played in four NCAA Championships, joining Rick Cramer (1979-82), Bob Kalinowski (1991-94), Matt Zions (1999-2002) and Kane Webber (2000-04). Tolan played in the 2006, 2007 and 2008 regionals as well as in the finals last year.
u Tolan and Grady remain in fierce competition for CU's stroke average title. Through 38 rounds (684 holes), just two strokes separate the two, with Tolan owning a 71.92 figure and Grady on his heels at 71.97.
u The round was played in near perfect conditions, with cloud cover keeping the temperature around 60 degrees with occasional light breezes.
u In the West Region Thursday, 36 players bettered (19) or equaled (17) par without a round in the 80s; in the Northeastern, Central, South Central and Southwest regions combined, there were 29 (19 and 10, respectively), with the high rounds in each 97, 88, 88 and 90. The Southeast had 44 such rounds (29 subpar); the Northeast was the toughest, with one player matching par but the rest of the 75-man field all over it.
u The Buffs went to watch the other white ball Thursday after a late afternoon practice round, taking in the New York Mets-San Francisco Giants baseball game at AT&T Park.