Cardinal competes in San Diego Invitational including 4 of nation's top 12 teams

San Diego CC - click to enlarge

Freshman Patrick Rodgers, junior Andrew Yun, senior co-captain David Chung, sophomore Cameron Wilson and freshman Patrick Grimes competed for Stanford in the San Diego Intercollegiate played at San Diego Country Club Feb 13-14.  Live scoring is provided by GolfStat for the event.  The coaches reported that "the team for San Diego has been decided based on Hawaii qualifying, the Hawaii tournament and also a qualifying shoot out on February 8th - http://www.golfgamebook.com/club/leaderboard0211/2up-mq3s".


Final Results:
No doubt the Cardinal team was disappointed in their 8th place finish, 32 strokes behind Washington and 25 behind USC.  As Ass't Coach Phil Rowe reports below the team did not manage the firm, fast and undulating greens well.  Once again Patrick Rodgers (74-77-71 222) was low man as he finished 17th individually 8 shots behind the individual winner, Alex Ching from the University of San Diego.  This was the first tournament that Patrick did not finish in the top 10.  Andrew Yun tied for 26th (76-76-73 225), Cameron Wilson tied for 28th (77-77-72 226), David Chung tied for 40th (80-73-76 229) and Patrick Grimes was 79th (85-83-79 247).  


Asst Coach Phil Rowe said afterward "on the final day, Coach Ray came in to save the day and we were thus 11 shots better! Conditions were all round more favorable since a little overnight rain had softened the greens somewhat. The players also had a chance to leave the venue and return with a fresh perspective on the game conditions at hand. The final round was a gritty one after the first long 36 hole day where conditions and scores just got away from us. 

Looking forward, potentially we will be faced with similar challenges at Pasatiempo for the Western Intercollegiate and at Riviera for the NCAA Nationals. Clearly the our experiences at San Diego will help us direct our training and game plans for those events so we now eagerly look forward to our next events."

Final round scorecards are shown below - as always click to enlarge.

Final round scorecards - click to enlarge

Round 2 Results:
After darkness ended day one, round 2 was completed early on day two leaving the Cardinal in 9th position, 27 strokes behind leading Washington.  Stanford shot a 303 total as Patrick Rodgers was tied for 23rd (74-77), Andrew Yun tied for 29th (76-76), David Chung tied for 34th (80-73), Cameron Wilson tied for 41st (77-77) and Patrick Grimes 81st (85-83).  Round two scorecards are shown below - click to enlarge.  See Coach Rowe's comments about the first day below.

Round 2 scorecards - click to enlarge

Day 1 Results:
Play was called on account of darkness leaving Stanford in 8th place 23 strokes behind leading Washington and 20 strokes behind USC.  The Cardinal along with all teams finished 14-16 holes of round two after a first round total of 307 left it tied for 10th.  Round 1 scores found Patrick Rodgers at 74, Andrew Yun at 76, Cameron Wilson at 77 and Patrick Grimes at 85.  It was a tough day for the Cardinal as summarized succinctly by Assistant Coach Phil Rowe: 


"The San Diego Country Club is a fantastic and historic course with some connections with Stanford (William Bell: architect and the venue of Mickey Wright's 4th US Women's Open Championship  http://www.sandiegocountryclub.org/club/scripts/library/view_document.asp?GRP=8608&NS=PUBLIC&APP=80&DN=HISTORY) but today was not the day of the Cardinal!

There were only light to moderate winds and the rain that was forecast did not show until mid afternoon, however the better than expected weather conditions did not diminish the challenges presented by the course. Indisputably the greatest of those challenges were the firm, rapid and undulating greens. At the end of the first day with 36 holes in the books we find ourselves with a huge deficit over the leading teams. Today we did not manage the conditions as well as teams like USC who we were paired with. Some great putts early on by the Trojans took their momentum on a completely different trajectory. We clearly have much to learn from playing with those USC players today and look forward to turning the tables tomorrow."

Tournament Background
The San Diego State and USD men's golf teams host the San Diego Intercollegiate, Feb. 13-14. The 54-hole event will take place at the par-72, 7,033-yard San Diego Country Club in Chula Vista, Calif.

The hosts will be joined by co-host USD, as well as Arizona State, Augusta State, Cal State San Marcos, Coastal Carolina, Lamar, Point Loma Nazarene, San Diego, Southern California, Stanford, Tennessee, Texas-Arlington, UCLA, UC San Diego and Washington.

Seven of the 15 schools are ranked in the nation's top 50, headlined by No. 4 UCLA, No. 5 Washington, No. 8 Stanford, No. 12 Southern Cal. Two-time defending national champion Augusta State will also make their second trip to the San Diego area in the last three years after competing in the 2010 NCAA regional at Carlton Oaks.

Day one action, which includes two rounds, gets underway Monday morning with a shotgun start at 8 a.m. PST. The final 18 holes begin with tee times on No. 1 and No. 10 from 7:30-9:30 a.m. Live scoring will be available on golfstat.com and the event is free to the public.