Men's Golf - The Invitational At The Ford - Final Results

[knightfan7]

Starting Monday, the Men's Golf Team tees it up at the Ford River and Golf Club in Richmond Hill, Ga. The course is a Par 72, Pete Dye design that can play as long as 7409 yards. These guys sure get to play some outstanding courses. The inaugural 2 Day, 54 hole tournament comprises one of the smaller fields you'll see with only 8 teams plus individuals instead of the usual 12-16 teams .

The Field

#39 Notre Dame
#43 Wake Forest
#73 Michigan
#80 RUTGERS
#85 Utah
#93 Michigan State
#106 Wisconsin
#108 Georgia Southern

This is the 2nd tourney in a row RU faces Michigan, Michigan's Hunter Thompson was the Individual Champion the last time, shooting an 8 Under 64 in the final round to win by 2 strokes. It is also the 1st of 3 tourneys in a row RU and Mich St will be in the field. This is the 3rd time RU's Martin Leon faces his former Utah teammates. In all RU has already faced all of the field except perhaps Ga Southern this season. Ga Southern is on the schedule again later this season as are a couple of the others.

Rutgers hasn't posted their lineup but appears they will have their regular 5 member team and at least 1 playing as an individual.

EDIT: Meant to add current B1G Rankings out of 306 D1 programs.....

#20 Illinois
#28 Ohio State
#32 Purdue
#38 Northwestern
#46 Indiana
#73 Michigan
#80 RUTGERS
#89 Minnesota
#93 Michigan State
#103 Iowa
#106 Wisconsin
#111 Nebraska
#127 Penn State
#213 Maryland

 

[knightfan7]

It was not a good day for the Men's team as they stand 8th and last after 2 rounds.

Weston Jones (T14) had the best day shooting 70-72 (-2). Xavier Marcoux (T18) followed with 70-73 (-1). Martin Leon is +3, Rhett Sellers +5, and Luke Wells +6. Derek Gutierrez, playing as an individual shot 73 but has not had a score posted yet for Round 2.

Standings

Wake Forest..........-22
Wisconsin..............-17
Notre Dame..........-10
Ga Southern..........-4
Utah........................-4
Michigan State......-1
Michigan.................E
Rutgers...................+5

The final round tees off tomorrow.

A finish like this would likely have a negative impact on RU National Ranking.

 

[knightfan7]

Led by Xavier Marcoux and Rhett Sellers shooting twin 5 Under 67's, Rutgers shot a 7 Under 281, their best round of the 3 by far. It looked like it wouldn't matter at all till RU and Mich St played their 17th and 18 holes. First RU as a team shot even par, then a bit later MSU shot +3. That was enough for RU to pass them and finish 7th.

Marcoux finished the tourney -6 which was good enough for a T8. Sellers finished T20. Luke Wells shot a 1 under 71, finishing T42. Weston Jones and Martin Leon shot 76, ending up T31 and T46. Playing as an individual, Fr Derek Gutierrez shot 70 (-2), finishing T25 at 1 Over.

Champion Wisconsin golfers finished 1st and 2nd with a combined score of 25 Under. It seems to me Wisky is doing exactly what they did last year. Not a great Fall but ramped it up in the Spring when they passed up to 20 teams among them RU and Iowa all the way to an NCAA At Large bid. They have a larger hill to climb this year but this is a heck of a step in that direction.

Final Results

Wisconsin.........-24
Wake Forest.....-23
Notre Dame.....-18
Michigan...........-8
Utah..................-6
Ga Southern....-5
RUTGERS..........-2
Michigan St.......E

Rutgers next outing will be this coming Mon-Tue at the Colleton River Collegiate Charity Golf Championship in Bluffton, SC. This will be the 3rd year in a row Rutgers has played in this event, finishing 10th out of 15 in '22 and and 4th out of 12 last March.

The Knights will for the 2nd week in a row face host school Mich St, and '22 and '23 Colleton champ, Georgia Southern. Some other teams entered are the B1G's Indiana, PSU, and Minnesota along with Mizzou, Kansas St, and Iowa St.

 

[knightfan7]

As I expected wit the result, RU dropped 7 places to #87, 1 spot behind #86 Minnesota and 8th in the BIG10. Michigan dropped 2 spots to #75

On the other hand, Wisconsin's win wasn't worth as much as I expected moving up 12 spots to #94.