Jackets Tied for 9th at NCAA Golf Championship – Men’s Golf — Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets

Carlsbad, Calif. – In the wake of a last-minute substitution due to a back injury to All-American Christo Lamprecht, Georgia Tech played solid golf for the first 10 holes of round 2 of the NCAA Division I Men’s Golf Championship, but couldn’t ran into trouble the back nine at the Omni LaCosta Resort and Spa and dropped into a tie for ninth place after 36 holes.

Lamprecht, the world No. 1 amateur player and the ACC Player of the Year who shot a 2-under-par 70 in the opening round Friday, was unable to play Saturday after back issues flared up prior to the Yellow Jackets’ 8:30 a.m. tee time. Sophomore Aidan Tran (Fresno, Calif.), Tech’s alternate player during this post-season, replaced him the lineup, but was unable to deliver a counting score for the Jackets.

Tech posted a 13-over-par round of 301 Saturday after posting the fourth-best total in the field in Friday’s opening round. After making three birdies at the par-5 10^th hole to get to 1-under-par for the round and move up to second place, the Jackets lost 12 strokes to the field between the 12^th and 17^th holes, the most difficult stretch on the golf course. They are tied with East Tennessee State, one of their playing partners for the first two rounds, at 17-over-par 593, 16 shots off the pace set by Virginia, the No. 7 seed in the championship.

Head coach Bruce Heppler said after the round that it is unlikely Lamprecht would be able to play round 3 barring a significant change in his condition Sunday morning. Round 3 gets underway at 9:40 a.m. EDT Sunday morning, with Tech set to start from the first tee at 7:35 a.m., paired with East Tennessee State and Florida State.

The 30-team field will be cut to the top 15 teams plus nine individuals not on one of those teams at the conclusion of Sunday’s round. Those teams and individuals will play a fourth and final round of stroke play Monday to determine the individual champion and the eight teams that advance to the match play bracket. The 15^th-place team after 36 holes is Stanford (+22).

TECH LINEUP – Senior Bartley Forrester (Gainesville, Ga.) posted the low round for the Yellow Jackets Saturday, a 2-over-par 74, while freshmen Kale Fontenot (Lafayette, La.) and Carson Kim (Yorba Linda, Calif.) each posted a 75.

First-round leader Hiroshi Tai (Singapore), who shot 67 on Friday, was even par through 13 holes before hitting a bogey-triple bogey-bogey stretch from 14-16 and finished with a 77….