The men’s golf team tees off the Pacific-10 Conference Championships at the Big Horn Country Club in Palm Desert, Calif., today. The tournament runs through Wednesday, and if the Ducks win the tournament, they earn an automatic bid into the NCAA West Regional May 18-20.
The Ducks are coming off a 10th-place finish at the U.S. Intercollegiate, April 15-16 at Stanford, Calif. Sophomores Joey Benedetti and Derek Sipe delivered top-15 performances. Benedetti finished tied for 12th before the event was suspended because of rain.
“We’ve been good enough to compete with these teams for one or two rounds of a tournament this season, but we’ve also been inconsistent enough where one bad round has taken us out of
contention,” Oregon coach Steve Nosler said in a University press release. “The most important thing now is for these guys to try to have some fun and finish the season on a high note.”
Benedetti’s performances have set the tone for the rest of the Ducks as he has a stroke average of 73.8. Following Benedetti in scoring average is All-American Gregg LaVoie, at 74.0.
Whether the Ducks continue their season will rely heavily on their performance at the Pac-10 Championships.
“I’m pretty happy with the group we’re taking because they seem pretty committed to finishing the season on a high note and I believe that they can,” Nosler said. “We’re being realistic in that we probably need to win to advance to the NCAA regionals, but at the same time if we have a high finish and beat some ranked teams, who knows?”
Six Ducks are competing in the event. The team score is then taken from the top five scores. Benedetti and Sipe, seniors LaVoie and Chris Dukeminier, and juniors Matt Ma and Dustin Pewarchuk will compete for the Ducks.
At last year’s Pac-10 Championships the Ducks finished fifth, which was Oregon’s best finish since 2002.

Lady Ducks head to 20th Pac-10 Championships
The Oregon women’s team travels to Oro Valley Country Club in Tucson, Ariz., for the conference championships today through Wednesday. All 10 teams competing are ranked in the top-50 this week.
Freshman standout Cathryn Bristow leads the Ducks against No. 2 UCLA, No. 3 Arizona State, No. 6 USC, No. 12 California, No. 19 Arizona, No. 21 Stanford, No. 27 Washington, No. 42 Washington State and No. 49 Oregon State. The Ducks are ranked 43rd after their win in the Illini Spring Classic in Champaign, Ill., April 14-15.
Bristow, a New Zealand native, on average has posted the Lady Ducks’ lowest score on the year. Her first-place finish at the Illini Spring Classic was her second outright tourney title of the year. As of last week, Bristow is ranked 101st in the nation.
Junior Kim McCready was ranked earlier in the season, but has since struggled with injuries for the Ducks. In last year’s Pac-10 Championships McCready finished in a tie for 37th.
Senior Erin Andrews led the Ducks last season as she finished in a tie for 28th.
The rest of the Ducks heading to Tucson are senior Michelle Timpani and junior Therese Wenslow. This will be Timpani’s fourth conference championship for the Ducks and Wenslow’s third because she was out last year with an injury.
Oregon qualified three times for the NCAA Regional Championships last season and finished in  10th place.