Southland championship begins Monday
4/24/2011 7:50:00 PM | Men's Golf
Sam Houston State's five-man team of Blaine Weiterman, James Glenn, Kort O'Leary, Jeff Litwak and Justin McKay will tee off from 9:04 a.m. to 9:36 a.m. Monday. Teams in the 54-hole event will play 18 holes each day through Wednesday. The championship is being played on a par 72, 7,304-yard course.
The Bearkats finished third in the team competition last year.
Southeastern Louisiana will try to repeat its championship from a season ago. The Lions and UT Arlington are the top two seeds entering the tournament and will play together in Monday's opening round with approximate tee times from 9:20 through 9:52 a.m.
The Lions are led by sophomore Philipp Westermann, who tied for fourth last year. Last year's conference freshman of the year is averaging 72.0 strokes in 26 rounds this year and has already been named the conference's golfer of the month for April with wins in the Lions' last two tournaments. He won the BancorpSouth Intercollegiate April 4-5 and then won the Jim West Intercollegiate April 12-13. Horacio Leon also picked up an individual win, claiming top honors at the Squire Creek Classic back in October. Cedric Scotto, who was the conference medalist in 2009, is back to help the Lions in defense of their title. He tied for seventh last year. Rhys West and Daniel Zuluaga round out Southeastern's championship roster.
UT Arlington won two tournaments this year, picking up wins at the Lone Star Invitational in October and at the San Diego Intercollegiate in March. The Mavericks are led by senior Zack Fischer, who is averaging 72.7 strokes in 30 rounds this season. Fischer tied for the individual lead in the 2009 championship, but lost to Scotto in a playoff. Three Mavericks picked up individual wins this season. Hunter Brown tied for first at the St. Edward's Individual Championship in February. Paul McConnell won the San Diego Intercollegiate and Enrique Livas edged Brown for top honors at the UT Dallas Spring Classic in March. Joining Fischer, McConnell and Brown at the conference tournament are Wes Worster and Carson Kallis.
The Mavericks are in search of their fourth conference championship and first since 2005.
Lamar will try to get back on top of the team leader board after ending its four-year reign with a sixth-place finish last year. The Cardinals are the most decorated team in Southland men's golf history with 23 tournament titles, including seven of the last 10. They won the first 10 conference tournaments in from 1964-73. No other team has won the event more than three times.
Kevin Hesbois tied for seventh and Pierre-Alexis Rolland tied for ninth last year for the Cardinals. Hesbois paces Lamar with a 73.0 stroke average in 31 rounds this season and was one of three golfers in the Southland to fire a low-round of 65. M.J. Daffue, who was the conference player of the month in February, won the Wolfpack Spring Open earlier this month. Hesbois, Rolland and Daffue will be joined at the tournament by Xavier Feyaerts and Erik Knudson.
For the first time, Central Arkansas is playing the conference tournament as a fully eligible conference member. The Bears have five team wins during the 2010-11 season, which is the most of any league team. UCA won the Kansas State Jim Colbert Intercollegiate in September, the Tennessee-Martin Skyhawk Classic and the UMKC Bill Ross Intercollegiate in October, and the Samford Invitational and Triumph at Pauma Valley in March.
Steven Lecuyer, the only two-time conference golfer of the month this season, enters the championship with a league-best 71.9 stroke average in 26 rounds. He is one of two individual medalists for the Bears this year, winning at Samford in March. Gideon Pienaar is the other after winning at Kansas State in September. Joining Lecuyer and Pienaar in Fort Worth are Jad Sinclair, Antonio Costa and Austen Moix. Lecuyer tied for second at last year's conference tournament, while Pienaar was sixth and Rolland finished in a tie for ninth.
Three players account for four other individual tournament wins this season, giving Southland golfers 13 medalists in 2010-11. Nicholls freshman Kristjan Einarsson became the first Colonel to win multiple tournaments in the same season. He won the Houston Baptist Intercollegiate in October and the Grub Mart-Young Oil Intercollegiate in March. Texas State senior Philip Krebsbach tied for first at the St. Edward's Individual Championship and McNeese State freshman Mick Huffman tied for first at the Houston Baptist Invitational in October.
The conference tournament is slated to tee off Monday at 8 a.m. Pairings are based on team seeding, which is calculated using the Golf Stat division rankings. Players will play 18 holes of golf Monday and Tuesday before playing the final round of 18 holes Wednesday.
Ten Southland universities field a men's golf teams: Central Arkansas, Lamar, McNeese State, Nicholls State, Sam Houston State, Southeastern Louisiana, Stephen F. Austin, UT Arlington, UTSA and Texas State.
In the most recent Golfweek collegiate rankings, Southeastern Louisiana is ranked No. 62, followed by No. 66 UT Arlington, No. 69 Lamar and No. 71 Central Arkansas.
Live scoring for the 2011 Southland Conference Men's Golf Championship will be available at www.southland.org .
