Georgia Tech, playing with the Hogs and UNC, is on a birdie binge this morning and has overtaken the Hogs for first place. Hogs are even par today and remains second by a shot. UNC is another 8 shots back.
Fifth place Northern Illinois is 13 shots behind the Hogs. Sixth place Georgia Southern is 16 back. Top five after today advance to the national tournament starting May 26 in Scottsdale, AZ.
I don’t know if we’re trying to rope-a-dope our way into the top 5 or what, but we’re have a terrible round…worst in the field…even the bottom feeders that we had a 60 stroke lead on after 2 days.
Puzzling, after the two sizzling days we’ve had before this round.
That’s golf. A guy will shoot 62 one day and 75 the next, on the same course. Weather may be playing a factor; they had some overnight rain so the course may be playing longer (that same rain is expected to get to Casa SF this afternoon).
Tied for second now with New Mexico. Segundo Pinto is tied for third individually at -12.
But the important thing here is nailing down that top 5. And we still have a 13-shot cushion on Georgia Southern as of 12:15 pm ET. Our guys teed off first, so get off the course and GSU will be trying to catch them from behind.
Julian Perico is off the course with a -1; at the moment he’s the only Hog under par for the day. Three others are even par. We’re not playing badly, just not making birdies. Currently in third place with a 14 shot cushion over GSU. Get to nationals, we start over from scratch; winning the regional means squat.
Right now it looks like 7 SEC teams may advance: Hogs; Auburn and Vandy in the Auburn regional; Georgia and Florida in the Bath (MI) regional; Moo U at Morgan Hill (CA), Bama at Zero U. Florida is tied for fifth and would have to win a tiebreaker if that holds; LSU is in sixth, 6 shots outside the cutline at Zero U. Ole Miss, TAM, Misery and Mustard all appear to be toast unless they start making a bunch of birdies. A&M is seven shots below the cutline; so is Tennessee, with OM and Misery even farther back. UALR is 8 shots below the cutline at Bath.
Back up to second place with some late birdies. Mateo is -2 for the day playing 18. Pinto is -1 playing 17. Basically there’s not enough time left to lose a bunch of shots, and at the moment our throw-out score is even par. The cushion over 6th place is now 16 shots.
Is this being televised or streamed?
Nope. Nationals will be televised starting the 26th, but none of the regionals.
How are you following?
https://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=27708
We have one player still on the course who is even par. Even if he makes a quadruple bogey on 18, that score will be thrown out. We’re in.
From the link above, click on Arkansas to get our hole by hole scores. Red is good, yellow is very good, green and blue are bad. No blues today.
Finished the round with a flourish; Segundo Pinto birdied 18. We finish second behind G-Tech. UNC third. GSU has a four-shot lead on TAM and host Clemson for fifth place, so one of them could possibly climb in in the late holes.
I completely get all of that and could even have written it word for word.
Thing is, however, that if it was condition related, all of the teams in the regional should have been affected…not just Arkansas. So you have to throw that one out in this narrow discussion. Bottom line is that, at the time I posted, the team that had not only led - but in dominant fashion - the first two days was the WORST of all the teams in the field more than 1/2 way through the day’s action. One would have to think that was somewhat tied to a conservative strategy on a day when all the other teams were below par and scoring was good.
In any event - we qualified for the Final, which is all that mattered.
Aggies and Clemson finished tied for the 5th spot. Wonder if it is decided by scorecard or if all 5 players for each time play another hole?
In the D2 Regionals all 5 went back out and played 5 different holes. Each team had a player start on holes 14 thru 18, like a shotgun start. I assume all NCAA Regionals will use the same format.
Ironically, one D2 regional had Henderson, SAU and Harding in a playoff for the last 2 spots to advance. Henderson got knocked out after all 15 players completed 1 hole.
Golfstat says all five players for TAM and Clemson will go out and concurrently play 14-18, par 22. Best total score wins. I assume that means one guy from each team will play each hole and only that hole.
Aggies won the playoff, -3 to -1 for the five holes.
Qualifiers from the SEC: Auburn, Vandy, Hogs, Aggies, Florida, Moo U, Bama.
High nationally ranked teams that didn’t make the 30-team field for nationals: #12 Tennessee, #27 K-State, #21 Okie Lite, #19 Arizona, #20 Rebnecks, #23 San Diego State, #26 Georgia Southern.
Hogs were ranked #35, by the way.
Hogs’ 45-under score was a school record for a three-day tournament, by the way, in spite of Wiz’ criticism. Tech was just a little better. So be it. Main thing is to advance; Tech doesn’t get any extra shots at nationals for winning the regional.