narrominded
For this issue of Narrominded
I’d like to give you a report of
how our golf team’s season went.
We’ve recently just finished our
conference championship in
McKinney, Texas where we
battled the rest of the Southland
conference schools, the course,
Mother Nature and mostly
importantly, ourselves. But I’ll
save that for the end.
As usual, our year starts out
at the Sam Hall Intercollegiate
hosted by the University of
Southern Mississippi at the
Hattiesburg Country Club. It’s a
treat for me to attend this event
every year as I was a member of
the USM Golf Team way back
in the fall of 1988 and spring
0f 1989. Sam Hall is a long
time member of HCC and the
former coach of their golf team.
I just missed him by a couple of
years but have known him since
those good old college days.
Another reason this event
is special is their assistant
coach is former SLU golfer
and Ponchatoula native Eddie
Brescher. To add a bit more
nostalgia to the mix, Eddie
worked for me during my tenure
at Oak Knoll Country Club.
Despite this home cooking, we
got off to a slow start in the fall.
Our 10th place finish out of 18
teams was not exactly what we
were looking for.
From there we went to the
Jim
Rivers
Intercollegiate
where Louisiana Tech is the
host. Perhaps the best course in
the state was the venue for our
second event of the fall. Squire
Creek is quite a challenge, and
we were up for it as we finished
a respectable 6th. The highlight
of the week was sophomore
Bailey Smith placing 6th
individually in only his second
college tournament.
We then played in the David
Toms Intercollegiate, of course
hosted by LSU, at The University
Club in Baton Rouge. We were
a bit disappointed in our 8th
place finish as we know the
course very well. Southeastern,
La. Tech, UL, and ULM were
all within four shots of each
other with our team being on
the wrong end of the four shots.
That really stung.
We ended the fall by playing a
great new course in El Dorado,
Arkansas, called Mystic Creek.
ULM hosts the event on
this course where the greens
can make you feel as if you
were playing a mini Augusta
National. Great condition but
very fast and undulating greens
were quite a challenge for all
players, not just us. A lack luster
7th place finish was how we
ended our fall season.
We started off the spring
season with a bang at the All
American Intercollegiate. The
University of Houston and
Rice are co-hosts of perhaps
the strongest field we played
in all year. Six ranked teams
highlighted by number one
Vanderbilt were in the field
with a host of highly ranked
individuals. We finished 6th out
of 18 and were only five shots
out of 4th behind Rice and
Auburn, both ranked in the
top 30. Senior James Anstiss
finished tied for second in the
field. They played at the Golf
Club of Houston where the
Shell Houston Open is played.
Not bad at all.
However, we couldn’t hold
that momentum as over our
next three events, we really
struggled. Low finishes at the
Louisiana Classic, UTSA Lone
Star Intercollegiate and the Old
Waverly Invitational derailed
us during the midseason. It
was especially upsetting to
play poorly in UL’s event in
Lafayette as we know and love
Oakbourne Country Club so
much. After playing poorly in
Mississippi State’s event at Old
Waverly, we definitely needed a
hard self-evaluation for the rest
of the year. Luckily it worked.
Back-to-back second place
finishes followed at the Jim West
Intercollegiate hosted by Texas
State just outside Austin and the
LSU Tiger Classic. Only fourth
ranked LSU beat us at the
University Club, and the field
included 18th ranked Texas A
& M and 27th ranked Arkansas.
We were actually leading the
Tigers as well after the first
round but couldn’t hold off the
high powered lineup.
Now, we were really pumped
for the Southland Conference
Championship. We were playing
well and even more importantly,
feeling good about ourselves. We
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