May 10, 2010
ONE MORE DANCE; VCU SELECTED FOR NCAA GOLF REGIONALS
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RICHMOND, Va. –The Rams are set to dance again.
The Virginia Commonwealth University Golf Team earned an at-large berth to the 2010 NCAA Regional at the University of Washington Monday. The Rams will be the No. 12 seed in the 13-team region at the Gold Mountain Golf Club in Bremerton, Wash.
It will be one of six 54-hole regionals to be conducted May 20-22. The top five teams and top individual not on a top-five team will qualify for the NCAA Championships June 1-6 at The Honors Course in Chattanooga, Tenn.
It’s VCU’s second consecutive NCAA Regional appearance. The Rams earned a bid in the 2009 Northeast Regional last season, via an automatic bid after winning the Colonial Athletic Association Championship. VCU placed 12th out of 14 teams at the Galloway National Golf Club in Galloway, N.J.
The bid was a sweet surprise for the Black and Gold, which weathered a bumpy spring season and finished third at the CAA Championships April 16-18. Now the Rams get a chance to rewrite their own history.
“After a solid fall, the spring was a disappointment from start to finish – not for lack of effort - we just weren’t able to make things happen. But in the end, the fall season and our strength of schedule was able to get us into tournament,” said VCU Coach Matt Ball. “We’re playing with house money. We get a chance to start a new season all over again. One thing about golf is that nobody plays good all the time, and hopefully we come back fresh, and I think the guys are really, really excited about the chance.”
VCU has appeared an NCAA Regional six times previously. The school’s best finish came in 2002, when the Rams placed fifth at the East Region in Atlanta, earning VCU’s only NCAA Championship bid.
Senior Lanto Griffin (Blacksburg, Va.), the 2009 CAA Player of the Year and a two-time All-CAA selection, leads the way for VCU. Griffin averaged 73.16 strokes per round and posted three top-10 finishes this season.
Gold Mountain Golf Club - Bremerton, Washington
Hosted by the University of Washington
Teams:
1. Washington (Pacific-10 Conference)
2. Southern California
3. Illinois (Big Ten Conference)
4. Oregon State
5. San Diego
6. Colorado State (Mountain West Conference)
7. Middle Tennessee
8. SMU
9. New Mexico
10. Fresno State
11. Eastern Michigan
12. VCU
13. Loyola (Maryland) (Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference)
Individuals:
1. Espen Kofstad, Denver
2. Austin Graham, UC Davis
3. Brandon Crick, Nebraska
4. Gabe Maier, Wyoming
5. Rodolfo Cazaubon, North Texas
6. Kyle Peterman, Western Illinois
7. Ben Blundell, Oklahoma
8. Kevin Tucker, Washington State
9. Nathan Sutherland, Miami (Ohio)
10. Carlos Ortiz, North Texas
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