After several shaky tournament performances in the last few weeks, the Oregon men’s golf team earned a much-needed confidence booster in its final tournament before postseason play.
Oregon shot a final-round 288 on Sunday to finish the U.S. Intercollegiate fifth in the 16-team field. Oregon shot a combined score of 856. Stanford hosted the two-day event at the 6,786-yard, par-71 Stanford Golf Course.
The Ducks were led by senior John Ellis, who, after finishing the first round with a season-low, 4-under 67, secured a second-place tie with a strong individual performance in Sunday’s final. Ellis, approaching the end of his illustrious career with the Ducks, finished the tournament tied with UC-Irvine’s Jeff Coburn at 6-under 207. Ellis was edged out by only one stroke by tournament champion Mike Warman of San Diego State, who finished at 7-under-par.
Oregon also received strong play from another veteran player in senior Chris Carnahan. Carnahan finished the tournament tied for 12th overall with a one-under-par 212.
Junior Jimmy White, designated as an individual scorer before the tournament began, finished the tournament tied for 22nd overall with a 2-over-par, while also tying a career low score with a 70 in Saturday’s second round. Individual scores do not count for or against the team score.
Had White’s score counted and had Oregon’s lowest scorer
competed as an individual, it would have improved the Ducks’ score by 16 strokes and Oregon would
have shared the tournament title with UCLA.
Junior Mike Sica finished 34th overall, followed by freshman Gregg LaVoie at 37th. Rounding out the scoring for the Ducks was redshirt freshman Kyle Johnson, who finished tied for 79th overall.
With the Pacific-10 Conference Championships looming next week, Oregon appears to be peaking at the right time of the year. Oregon has three top-five finishes in its last four tournament appearances after going five-straight tournaments without finishing in the top 10.
UCLA was named the tournament champion after it blew away the competition with a 12-under 840 combined score, outpacing nearest challenger Oklahoma State by 10 strokes. San Diego State placed third, followed by Fresno State and the Ducks. Oregon finished fourth in last year’s U.S. Intercollegiate.
Oregon has a week off
before heading to the Pac-10 Championships April 28-30 in Glendale, Calif.