The Oregon men’s golf team tees off in the NCAA West Regional at 7 a.m. Thursday morning at Gold Mountain Golf Course in Bremerton, Wash., in their second consecutive NCAA Regional berth.
It is the first time the Ducks have advanced in back-to-back seasons since they went seven straight times from 1997 to 2003.
This year’s Ducks go in as the No. 16 seed in a 27-team field featuring eight teams from the Pacific-10 Conference. Southern California is the top seed in the West Regional and the No. 2 seed overall.
“It’s a very good seed and a very good situation for a young team like Oregon that plays three freshmen,” coach Casey Martin said in an Oregon release. “We’ve done a lot of work to get here and now the guys have the chance to relax and let it fly and see where that takes us.”
The top ten teams in the West Regional will advance to the National Championships, May 28-31 in West Lafayette, Ind.
Oregon last played Gold Mountain in October at the Husky Invitational, taking fourth on the strength of performances by freshmen Jack Dukeminier, who tied for eighth at 2-over-par, and Sean Maekawa, who tied for 31st. Both players shot even-par second rounds to jump the Ducks from seventh to fourth in the rain-shortened event.
Last year at the NCAA West Regional in Tempe, Ariz. the Ducks finished 19th. Joey Benedetti was Oregon’s highest finisher, tying for 62nd at 213. The Ducks’ other senior, Derek Sipe, tied for 86th in last year’s regional at 217.
Along with Benedetti and Sipe, Oregon is expected to compete freshmen Dukeminier, Maekawa and Isaiah Telles this week.
The last time Oregon advanced to the NCAA National Championship round was in 2003, led to a ninth-place finish in the West Regional by John Ellis, who tied for 22nd to lead the Ducks. Prior to that, the Ducks advanced twice consecutively in 1998 and 1999 behind Ben Crane, now a PGA Tour golfer.
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