OSUMG: Buckeyes Climb into 7th at Boilermaker Invitational
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(Team photo and tournament information courtesy of Ohio State Athletic Department.)
(Event scoring and statistics courtesy of BirdieFire.com)
In league with extraordinary gentlemen.
The Buckeyes traveled to West Lafayette, IN for the Boilermaker Invitational Saturday and Sunday. The course played to 7,465 yards and a par 72.
(That’s a lot of golf course). It has a
USGA course rating of 76.5 and a slope of 146.
(The highest slope rating assigned by the USGA is 155. With a rating of 146, Kampen is a very tough course. By comparison, my “home” course has a slope/rating of 72/123. Just sayin’)
The format a three round, 54 hole event of ‘play five count four’, where a school fields 5 players, and the low 4 scores for each round are counted.
This event has a fifteen team field, with four teams ranked in the Top-50 by Golfstat: Cincinnati, #2 Illinois, Indiana, #49 Kent State, Louisville, Miami (OH), #38 Michigan State, Northern Illinois, Northwestern,
Ohio State, #33 Purdue, Southern Illinois, Toledo, UCF, Wisconsin.
The participating players participating were: ,
Tee-k Kelly, Will Grimmer, Clark Engle,
Max Rosenthal and
Josh Wick. After a solid showing last week in the Kepler Intercollegiate, Max worked his way into the starting lineup for this event.
Overall
The Buckeyes yet again rode a strong final round and moved from 10th to 7th place. The team again had a total of 884 (+20), so maybe there is a late season “zone” for them.
The Buckeyes were led by Will Grimmer’s 217 (+1). His score also placed in in
8th place, another Top -10 finish for him. His four team mates were; Tee-K Kelly 220 (+4), Clark Engle 223 (+7), Josh Wick 224 (+8) and Max Rosenthal 244 (+28).
This was an encouraging finish. They had a good first round, an equally good second round and, again, a
very good third round. If OSU is close to an opponent prior to the 3rd round; they’ll track them down.
Player round by round scores, below:
Boilermaker Invitational Rd 1 Rd 2 Rd 3 Total To Par
Team 296 296 292 884 20
Tee-K Kelly 72 77 71 220 4
Will Grimmer 71 74 72 217 1
Clark Engle 76 72 75 223 7
Max Rosenthal 77 79 87 243 27
Josh Wick 78 73 74 225 9
0 0 0 0 0
8 8 4 20 20
First Round
The Buckeyes got solid performances from will Grimmer (-1) and Tee-k Kelly (E) in the morning’s first round. By the end of the round, the team score of 296 (+8) had them in 10th place.
The Buckeyes were led by
Will Grimmer 71 (-1) and
Tee-k Kelly 72 (E).
Clark Engle shot a 76 (+4) and
Josh Wick a 77 (+5) to round out the team scoring.
Max Rosenthal shot a 78 (+6).
Will had a fairly “mundane” round. He began his round with 5 pars, then had a 6 hole stretch with 1 birdie/1 bogey, then closed with 7 consecutive pars. This score was good enough to place Will 13th of 84 golfers. Mundane is good. Very good.
Tee-K also had an even-keeled round. His 1 birdie/1 bogey/16 par round was well under control. Even par, even keeled.
Clark led the team with 3 birdies, but 5 bogeys and a double threw some sand in his gears. Still, a round of 76 is a good round of golf.
Josh’s had a five hole stretch (#13-#17) where he was +2 without recording par, which can be tough to do. He leveled things out during the remainder of his round, playing his last six holes in +1, so he did finish well.
Max just couldn’t get anything going in the first round. Even though he shot nothing worse than a bogey, he also didn’t record any birdies.
For the round, the Buckeyes had 8 birdies, 62 pars, 18 bogeys and 2 double bogeys. This was not a bad opening round at all. On to the 2nd round…
Second Round
The Buckeyes duplicated their first round score with another 296 (+8) to remain in 10th place. They are in position to make a run to get inside the top 8 teams.
The Buckeyes were led by
Clark Engle’s 72 (E) and
Josh Wick’s 73 (+1).
Will Grimmer shot a 74 (+2) and
Tee-k Kelly a 77 (+5) to round out the team scoring.
Max Rosenthal shot a 79 (+7).
Will mixed a 2 birdie/4 bogey round into a well needed 74. I would have liked more birdies, but nothing worse than a bogey is a good round.
Tee-K couldn’t get anything going in the afternoon round. He did not have a birdie, but as with Grimmer’s round, nothing worse than a few bogeys on the card. If you’re not going to shoot “low”, then don’t shoot your team out of the event.
Clark had a relatively calm round of 2 birdies/2 bogeys. An even par round stabilized the ship on Saturday afternoon.
Josh’s had 6 bogeys, but countered with 5 birdies! He accounted for half of OSU’s birdies that round. He had to be chomping at the bit to get the 3rd round started.
Max rang up 2 birdies, but a handful of bogeys and a double bogey stalled out his round.
For the round, the Buckeyes combined for; 10 birdies, 56 pars, 23 bogeys and 1 double bogey. This was a very clean, solid round of team golf.Nothing great, but they kept themselves in the tournament.
This is the second consecutive round where the team played fairly decently. No one “went low”, but the team put together solid scores to keep them in position to improve their Top Ten standings. Steady as she goes after the first day. On to the 3rd round…
Third Round
The Buckeyes started their final round on hole #10 and finished their first nine holes with a team score of +6. Not bad, but not that great. However, for the back nine, they shot a team score of
-2; an impressive turnaround. Whatever they had at the half-way house seemed to work. Consequently, the team shot a team 3rd round score of 292 (+4) to move into 7th place. After the 2nd round, I felt that OSU, in 10th place, was positioned to move into the top 8. They finished 7th. It’s a good thing when this team is
that predictably good in their closing round.
The Buckeyes were led by
Tee-K Kelly 71 (-1) and
Will Grimmer 72 (E). Josh Wick (74 (+2) and Clark Engle (75 (+3) completed the team scoring.
Max Rosenthal got into the clubhouse, barely, with an 87 (+15)
Will spread out 3 birdies/3 bogeys/12 pars in a solid “foundation” round for coaches Moseley and Smith.
Tee-K was even par on his first nine holes, then on his back nine
birdied 4 of 5 holes. He scorched the course for 6 birdies. That is 1 birdie for every 3 holes played.
(In a little more than an hour, Tee-k got as many birdies as I would in a month.)
Clark stumbled a bit with a double bogey on the par-3 13th. But, he also carded 4 birdies, so it wasn’t too much of a stumble.
Josh’s muddled around with front 9 score of 39 (+3), but he absolutely demolished his back 9 (
3 birdies) for a 35 (-1). That’s a strong finishing kick.
Max, well Max had a round where you just want to get off the course without anyone getting hurt. Whatever magic he had at the Kepler wasn’t at the Boilermaker. Oh, well; next week is another week.
For the round, the Buckeyes combined for; 17 birdies, 56 pars, 24 bogeys, 4 double bogeys and 1 triple bogey. Don’t let the “big” numbers distract you; this was a clutch round of team golf.
Thoughts
We are now developing a trend with this team; good/decent scoring in the 1st round, bad scoring in the 2nd round then terrific golf in the final round. This broke trend a bit with the first two rounds having “not bad” scoring, but with a 3rd round that left no prisoners. This was a non-nonsense final round.
They did a nice job of game management in the 1st round, scoring only 2 double bogeys and not letting the round get away from them. The 2nd round was much better, with only 1 double bogey. Although Tee-k had no birdies in the round, his (only) 5 bogeys helped to keep the team in play. The 3rd round was interesting; of the 4 double bogeys and 1 triple bogey, they were all scored, except for a double bogey, by one player. Again, the team maintained the integrity of the team score.
Sifting through the chaff, here is a “what happened” snap-shot. They played the par 3’s fairly decently, scoring an average 3.30 (+18) ranking them 5th. They played the par 4’s not that well, to an average of 4.24 per hole, +36 to par, ranking them 12th. They played the par 5’s “OK”, to an average of 4.90 per hole, a total of -6 to par, ranking 8th.
In terms of “to par” scoring, Ohio State recorded 160 pars (again), placing them in 9th position in that measure. They recorded 36 birdies, placing them 9th.
The team did level out its 2nd round play, which kept them hanging around the Top 10. Yet gain, Ohio State closes with a very strong 3rd round. I like what I see about this team with their ability to close very strongly in their final rounds. This team has ‘gamers’. The post-season is going to be fun to watch.
Up Next
The OSUMG team will travel to Newburgh, IN for the Big Ten Championship from April 22-April 24. Post season starts. No mulligans.
Go Buckeyes!
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