Men's Golf News

Men Take Second Place at The Cardinal

A cold, windy Cardinal Golf Club greeted the Stormy Petrels as they returned to Greensboro, North Carolina to defend their 2007 victory at the Tom and Bettie O’Briant Memorial golf tournament hosted by Guilford College.  The tournament has been hosted since the mid 1970’s at the difficult Pete Dye designed Cardinal Golf Club.  Each of the last two years the O’Briant had been played at the Greensboro Country Club-Farm Course while the Cardinal underwent nearly 5 million dollars in course and clubhouse renovations, improvements and a significant amount of redesign at the course itself.

Oglethorpe won last year’s Tom O’Briant with a great come from behind….again….win at the Farm Course.  With the “new” Cardinal ready for play the 2008 Cardinal Collegiate moved back home.  The Stormy Petrel’s had designs on winning their 3rd tournament of the fall season and second consecutive O’Briant Tournament.

However, Methodist University and Mother Nature…..in that order…..had other ideas.  Methodist posted a first round solid 299 followed by host Guilford College’s 302.  The Petrels were on track for a sub 300 opening round and either a share of the lead or maybe the outright lead but ran into trouble on the final few holes. 

The nines have been switched back to their original sides from the 1970 design.  The final stretch of holes at the Cardinal now includes a tough par 5, 577 yard 15th, a difficult par 3 188 yard 16th and new tee boxes and greens on the 17th and 18th par 4 closing duo of holes.

“We lost a few strokes on #15 through #17 as the wind and temperature began to have an effect on play,” comments Coach Owen.  When we got to 18 we were still in position to close and be right at or near the lead, continued Owen.  We had to count, in our 4 team scores, two doubles and a triple bogey plus a par on #18 to, in effect, lose seven strokes to par on one hole.  It is hard to assume par on an extremely difficult hole like that with a severe hole location (front right) but we sure were not counting on dropping seven,” Owen continued.

The final tally was a 305 for Oglethorpe and a six stroke cushion for Methodist.  Guilford’s 302 gave them a three stroke edge with one round to go over the Stormy Petrel.

On day two the Petrels were faced by more than just the diabolical Pete Dye design, a 7000 yard course set up, and final round hole location that were very tough.  Mother Nature then came calling.  40 degree temperatures and 20 mph wind with gusts to 25 mph welcomed the 15 teams back to the course on Tuesday morning.

Oglethorpe was playing the event with four freshman and a sophomore Matt Rebitch due to several injuries sustained in the upper class ranks at the end of the Fall Season.

“The five youngsters really battled hard in near impossible conditions.  They may have never played on such a difficult course with such severe hole locations and such a lengthy course set up.”  They gained valuable experience and learned a lot about persevering and they also “won” the battle for second from Guilford and Rhodes, Owen added.  They also saw how Methodist played through the conditions and posted the best round in recent memory by a Monarch team in brutal conditions.”

“Looking back now par may have been 310 on Tuesday, Owen recalls.  Under that premise they were ten under, acknowledges Owen.  In perfect conditions it is hard to shoot low on that course.  A 300 in these conditions was superb.” Owen summarized.

Once Methodist sprinted out to a big final round lead at the turn it became a race for 2nd place.  Guilford had increased their lead on Oglethorpe and Rhodes at the end of the front nine.  “As best we could tell they probably had moved their lead from three to six or eight and Rhodes (playing on the front nine) may have moved in front of us,” continued Owen.

The Stormy Petrels closed very strong as the wind and weather continued to cause problems.  The closing holes of round one had gotten the better of the Petrels in round one but in round two the Petrels would get the final say.

 Rebitch played a strong back nine playing his last seven holes in just two over par to start the back nine charge.  Matt Bernstein played his final four holes in four over on day one, bounced back and played the same four holes one over in day two’s weather.  Icelandic National Team Member Olafur Loftsson  played the entire back nine in an impressive 2 over par including a tremendous par save on #18 that may have given the Petrels their final lead at the end.  Craig Stevenson’s final 5 holes were played in one over to hold his score steady.  Colin Chapman playing in the final group of the day, held on to our one stroke lead playing the last seven holes in only 2 over with a birdie on hole #14. Oglethorpe had four of its five players (all freshmen) in the Top 14.  Loftsson finished tied for 9th.  Chapman was 12th and Stevenson and Bernstein were tied for 14th.

A fifth freshman, Jordan Hall, playing as an individual had his best finish of the fall season as he totaled rounds of 78-78=156 and finished 12th individually.

For complete results from the Cardinal, visit the Golfstat site here.

The Stormy Petrels now will get some time off and prepare for the Spring Season.  The spring opens at the beautiful Mountain View Course at Callaway Gardens March 1-3.  It continues with back to back 54-hole events at Jekyll Island, GA and Camp Lejeune, NC in late March.  Emory hosts its spring event in mid April at Stone Mountain, Georgia and the 54 hole SCAC Conference Championship will be contested at Tunica National near Memphis, TN at the end of April.

The winner of the SCAC Conference Championship will represent the SCAC at the NCAA Division III National Championship.

The 2009 NCAA Championship will be played in the PGA Village at PGA Golf Club at Port St. Lucie, Florida May 11-16.  The championship will be played on both the Ryder and Dye courses for the Men’s Championship.  The Dye course will host the final two rounds of the 72- hole championship.

Visit  www.pgavillage.com for details about the courses.