Men’s Golf Competes Against Nationally Ranked Field
Coker took on five nationally ranked teams at the Eatonton.
Eatonton, Ga- Coker headed to Eatonton to take on a stacked field of talented teams as well as individual golfers. Coker faced three top-ten teams nationally ranked in Georgia Southwestern, Barry, and West Florida. The field had a total of five nationally ranked teams. Coker scored 297 on the first day of the tournament as the team stood in tied for 13th in team standings.
The course played tough for the field as each player went through 18 holes. Fred Tindale shot a 72 on a course that tests the minds and the skills of each athlete. Caleb Tidd finishes the day with a 74 through the 18 holes. Killian Ryan shot a 75 as he managed the difficult course. Jonathan Hallinger shot a 76 on the day and looked forward to the start of the next round the following morning. Derek McGlaughlin shot an 81 on the first day of the competition.
Coach Hackney had this to say:
"Cuscowilla has always been one of the toughest courses in this part of the country, and it held serve today against a great field of teams from the East Coast. I thought our guys hung in there and fought hard to post some decent scores, but again, we just didn't have anybody go under par, which has left us playing catch-up.
The field of 15 teams is separated by only 20 total shots. Since we only got to play 18 today (because of the frost delay) and will only play 18 more tomorrow. This is the kind of track that is very penal when you make a mistake. We were good off the tee, hitting 46 of 56 fairways among our counting scores, but we hit just 36 of 72 greens and only got up and down 11 of 33 times. You have to be very precise to hold these greens, so hopefully, we will be dialed in tomorrow. We can flip the script and go low, while some others could fall back. It's that kind of course.
We had 13 birdies as a team. Fred was solid and scrambled well all day (just 27 putts) to fire 2-over 72. Caleb was 2-under early before going on a bogey train but finished at 4-over 74 with a birdie on his last hole. Killian also rebounded from a double on his 17th hole to birdie the last for a 75 and Jonathan, after a rough start (5-over thru 4), knuckled down and shot 76 (+4), including three straight birdies to start the back nine.
I'm excited to see what we do tomorrow."