The men’s golf team completed its second tournament of the season, the Bayou City Collegiate Classic, finishing second out of 11th, going 25 under par.
This finish is a big improvement from the last tournament in which ACU finished 17th, going 32 strokes over par.
“We worked at it pretty hard,” said Head Coach Tom Shaw. “Nobody liked the finish in the first tournament, so there was some extra motivation to try and turn the tables for the next tournament. And we worked hard and got a couple of new faces in the lineup, and that seemed to make the difference for us.”
ACU started well, going 13 under par in the first round, 12 under par in the second round and finished by shooting on par in the third round. The team finished right under Sam Houston State, which went 27 under par for the tournament.
The two highest finishers for ACU were Preston Cooper, sophomore from Dallas, and Jaime Lewis, senior from Johannesburg, South Africa. Cooper finished fifth out of 80, going 10 strokes under par, and Lewis finished sixth, going nine under par.
The other Wildcats who competed were Trenton Johnson, senior from Brentwood, Tennessee, Preston DeFriend, sophomore from Lubbock, Jack Hollingsed, freshman from Dallas, and Gregoire Hoyeau, junior from Paris, France.
Johnson finished 24th, going two under par, DeFriend finished 31st, shooting even par, Hollingsed finished 55th, going six over par, and Hoyeau finished 60th, going eight over par.
“Everybody contributed, even our fifth guy. Greg did some good things the final round, and Jack Hollingsed at the individual got off to a great start,” Shaw said. “He’s a freshman so really important experience for him as a new college golfer. Everybody contributed well; it’s really a team effort.”
It will be a quick turnaround for the Wildcats as they will go to Dallas on Sunday for their next tournament, the Trinity Forest Invitational hosted by Southern Methodist University.
“It’ll definitely be a challenge for us, but these guys are used to a lot of golf. They should be able to bounce back quickly and hopefully use what we did well in last week’s tournament and apply it towards this week,” Shaw said. “I’m excited for the opportunity. I think that we’ll stack up well against the teams there.”
