Deacs Ahead of National Powers After Day One of Ben Hogan Collegiate

FORT WORTH, Texas – Behind a strong performance from freshman Boyd Owens, the Demon Deacons sit ahead of teams with a combined nine national championships at the Ben Hogan Collegiate Invitational in Fort Worth, Texas after two rounds of competition.

After strong finishes in his first two collegiate tournaments, Owens is looking to claim his highest finish to date at historic Colonial Country Club, leading the Demon Deacons who sit in ninth as a team but ahead of national powers like Georgia Tech, Oregon, Florida, Oklahoma and USC.

Owens, who sits in a tie for 12th after the opening round of competition, helped lead the charge for the Deacs in the second round of the day. He turned in the lowest score yet by a Wake Forest player, carding a 68 (-2) including shooting 4-under-par on the back nine holes.

He is one of just 21 players in the 80 player field to be under par, sitting at 1-under for the tournament with 18 holes to play.

Fellow freshman Andrew McLauchlan also had a strong finish to his day with a 69 (-1) that helped elevate him up the leaderboard. He sits inside of the top 30, elevating 25 spots on the individual leaderboard heading into Tuesday.

In his first two collegiate tournaments, McLauchlan has finished inside of the top 10 and is just four strokes out of the top 10 entering the final round.

In the third round, Wake Forest will be paired with host TCU, Georgia and Georgia Tech with the group set to tee off No. 10 starting at 9 a.m. ET.

From Coach Haas:

“I saw a lot of good things. We need to brush up on our scoring and we will be in business. It is a good field and we can still move up a lot of spots tomorrow with a good round. The team really hung in there that always makes me proud.” – Head Coach Jerry Haas

Day One Scores:

Team