Rafferty earns NCAA regional bid
5/4/2009 7:15:00 PM | Men's Golf
Fergal Rafferty has been named as one of the 10 at-large individual competitors in the NCAA Division I men's golf regional tournament to be held May 14-16 at the University of Texas Golf Club in Austin.
Rafferty's selection marks the sixth time a Sam Houston State men's golfer has earned a berth in the NCAA Division I regional.
The Austin event is one of six 54-hole regional tournaments to be conducted across the nation. The low five teams and the low individual not on those teams will advance to the finals from each regional.
The NCAA championships will be conducted May 26-30 at the Inverness Club in Toledo, Ohio. The University of Toledo is the host institution for this year's championships.
Other individual at-large selections for the Austin regional included Glenn Northcutt, Auburn; Ken Looper, New Orleans; Cole Moreland, Auburn; Adam Cornelson, New Orleans; Cedric Scotto, Southeastern Louisiana; Jeff Gerlich, Texas State-San Marcos; Matthew Carvell, Southeastern Louisiana; Corey Roberson, Texas State-San Marcos and Gonzalo Berlin, Jacksonville State.
Teams selected to the Austin regional are Stanford, Florida, Texas Tech, Texas, UNLV, California, Lamar, Michigan, Michigan, Texas-Arlington, Virginia Tech, Mississippi State, New Mexico State and Jackson State.
Past NCAA regional men's golf participants from Sam Houston have been Jeff Bellnap (1990), Dean Choate (1994), Brandt Kieschnick (1997 and 1999) and Todd Rossetti (1998). Bellnap posted the best finish by a Bearkat with a 13th place finish in 1990.
Rafferty, a junior from Carrickmore, Omagh in North Ireland, was a first team All-Southland Conference selection in 2009 after leading the Bearkats in stroke average with a 73.0 mark and placing eighth individually at the Southland Conference men's golf championship April 27-29.
Rafferty won two individual medalist titles this season, finishing first at the Texoma Shoot-out in Kingston, OK, Oct. 5-7 and the UTSA Fall Classic in Kerrville Oct. 28-29. He was the runner-up at the Hal Sutton Invitational in Shreveport, LA, April 6-7 and placed third at the North Texas Mean Green Classic at Denton Sept. 10-11. Rafferty helped lead Sam Houston State to five tournament team championships during the 2008-09 season
