Oct. 25, 2011 ALPHARETTA, Ga. -- The Husky Men's Golf team combined to shoot 4-under on the back nine during the final round of the U.S. Collegiate Championship on Tuesday to make a late push up the leaderboard but it wasn't enough to overtake UCLA, who walked away from the Golf Club of Georgia with a three shot victory. UCLA rode birdies on the final hole from all five of its golfers to claim team championship honors. The Huskies ended up tied with Auburn for second with a total of 855 (-9). Despite coming up short, the tournament has to be considered a success for Husky Coach Matt Thurmond and his Huskies. "It was a good job by our guys," Thurmond said about his No. 6 rated Huskies. "They showed great composure and were steady the whole tournament. Things kind of got away from us a little yesterday at the end, but today they showed great resilience. "We didn't start very well and nobody got going for us early, except Charlie [Hughes]."
Hughes shot 3-under on the front nine and Chris Williams was 2-under at the turn. The other three combined to go 8-over. "We did a great job of hanging in there and staying with it. Finally, we caught a few breaks later and the other teams came back to us." Washington entered the day tied for third with Auburn, trailing just second round leader Georgia Tech and UCLA. The Huskies and Auburn were both able to overtake the host Yellow Jackets after they imploded with a 10-over round. UW and the Tigers were each 3-under for the day. Leading the way on the final day was Hughes, who ended up firing a 69. Williams was next with a 70. Freshman Cheng-Tsung Pan ended up with the best finish among Huskies, sharing third-place at 212 (-4) with four other golfers. He entered today's final round tied for the lead, but never could overcome a double-bogey on the par-3 third hole and ended up +1 for the day. Williams ended up tied for 10th at -2 for the tournament. Cory McElyea ended a stellar tournament shooting a 2-over 74, but he ended up tied for 13th at 1-under. "Pan played great again, Chris finished in the top-10 and Cory had his best tournament in a long time," said Thurmond. "But, I'm equally excited that our worse finish was 26th." Hughes and sophomore Trevor Simsby each ended up +3 after 54 holes to share 26th. "Everybody really contributed to a great tournament," said Thurmond. Auburn's Dominic Bozzelli and Texas A&M's Johannes Veerman each shot 6-under to share medalist honors. Washington will wrap up its fall schedule at the Gifford Invitational at Cordevalle Country Club, starting Oct. 31.
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
