GRAND HAVEN, Mich. – Arizona Men’s Golf sank a flurry of birdies after the turn in Monday’s first round of the Folds of Honor Collegiate to end the day in fifth place at 5-over par. The Wildcats began the day on the back nine of American Dunes Golf Club with a total of three birdies before sinking an impressive 11 birdies as a team on the front nine. Senior Chase Sienkiewicz carded Arizona’s best round of the day at 1-under, which put him in a tie for fourth place.
“Today was a challenge for the entire field with some difficult conditions, but we really rose to the occasion,” said head coach Jim Anderson. “We played our best golf the day in the afternoon, and I felt like our team got sharper as the day went on. It was great to see every single player in the lineup card post lower scores as the day went on, which will give us some good momentum to make more moves in tomorrow’s round.”
Weather conditions and a challenging course set the stage for a difficult scoring day for the field as Florida State was the only program out of 18 to break par on the day. Only 11 of the 90 players in the field finish Monday’s round below par as well.
Behind Sienkiewicz on the player leaderboards after one round, freshman Filip Jakubcik sits in a tie for 17th at 1-over after shooting three-under on the final nine holes of the day. Junior Sam Sommerhauser is one stroke behind him in 25th place, and freshman Zach Pollo gives Arizona a fourth top-20 score at three-over par.
The Wildcats played their best on the course’s par 3’s, finishing tied for second in scoring average. Six of Arizona’s 14 birdies came on the shortest holes. Sienkiewicz tied CMU’s Jeffrey Andru’s for Monday’s best par-3 scoring average at 2.50. The Arizona freshmen tandem of Jakubcik and Pollo finished tied for second at 2.75.
Arizona enters Tuesday’s second round a stroke behind third-place Oregon State and Illinois as well as three strokes behind second-place Liberty.
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