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Golfers Finish 11th In Hawaii
February 08, 2008 | Men's Golf
HILO, Hawai'i ? The University of Colorado men's golf team couldn't build on its second round performance and slipped a notch into an 11th place finish here Friday in the Hawai'i-Hilo Intercollegiate, the first event of the spring season for the Buffaloes.
No. 5 Stanford claimed the team title with an 813 team score, which was 27 strokes under par. No. 7 USC and
Senior Michael Baird paced the Buffs, posting a final round 71 for a 206 (4-under par), which tied him for 13th place overall. He has performed well on the 6,738-yard, par-70 Waikoloa Village Golf Course layout, as he tied for 18th last year with a 205 score.
A good story for CU here was the play of senior Jim Grady, who entered the meet without ever recording a round in the 60's for his collegiate career. After a third straight 69 Friday, he not only posted the first top 20 finish of his career with a 3-under 207, tying him for 17th, Grady became just the fourth player in school history to post three straight rounds under 70.
His previous best finish was a tie for 23rd in the 2005 New Mexico Tucker Invitational.
Grady joins Scott Peterson (April, 1993), Kenny Coakley (February 2004) and Baird (last year in this same meet) as the only players to shoot three straight scores in the 60s; no one has reached four, and the record for the most consecutive rounds under par is five, set by John Lindberg in the spring of 1987.
“I was pleased with the play by Michael and Jim, and it was
good to see that out of the seniors,” head coach Roy Edwards said. “Michael has a chance to have a great spring, and he knows he has some room for improvement.
“Jim got off to a good start for his final semester,” he said. “We had a chat about a month ago and he's really made a commitment to having more confidence and to enjoy himself, to relax more. Really just to play the game and not worry about the outcome, and he's really been committed to that. It definitely showed here.”
“Overall, we struggled down the stretch,” Edwards noted. “We were hanging in there, but we just played the last seven holes poorly, something like 8-over. We were one or two under on Thursday with five or six holes to play, and we finished out four or five strokes under, but today we went the other direction.
“We weren't being in the present; we'd make a mistake and then make another one on top of that,” he continued. “It's something we have to work on.”
Freshman Michael Imperato (73-216) and sophomores Luke Symons (74-218) and Justin Bardgett (77-219) rounded out the action for the Buffaloes.
What was encouraging for the team as whole was the average score of the fifth man, or the “non-counting” team score. In the fall, that average was 79.7 (and 80.3 last year); in this tournament, it was 73.7.
T13.
T17. Jim Grady................................. 69-69-69?207
T57. Michael Imperato...................... 73-70-73?216
T73. Luke Symons............................ 74-70-74?218
T79. Justin Bardgett.......................... 73-69-77?219
TOP 5 INDIVIDUALS
1.
2. Rob Grube, Stanford .................. 65-67-67?199
2. Sihwan Kim, Stanford................. 69-63-67?199
4.
5. Three tied.................................................. 201
TEAM SCORES
1. Stanford................................. 275-263-275?813
2.
2. Southern
4. Georgia Tech......................... 275-272-277?824
5.
6.
6.
8.
9. TCU....................................... 284-275-280?839
10. UC-Davis................................ 288-277-279?844
11.
12.
13.
14.
14. CSU-Bakersfield.................... 283-283-292?858
16. Hawai'i-Hilo.......................... 282-286-293?861
17. Pacific................................... 291-282-293?866
18.
