Jackets Open Spring Golf Season in Hawai’i – Men’s Golf — Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets

THE FLATS – Beginning its quest to return to the NCAA Championship at season’s end, Georgia Tech’s 12^th-ranked golf team returns to the Big Island of Hawai’i for its first spring season event, the Amer Ari Intercollegiate, starting Thursday.

Twenty teams will compete over three days (Thursday through Saturday) at the Mauna Lani Resort’s North Course in the 34^th edition of the event, which has attracted an increasingly strong field over the years. This year’s field features nine teams nationally ranked in the Top 25, including six of the Top 10 – No. 2 Arizona State, No. 3 Auburn, No. 5 Texas, No. 6 North Carolina, No. 9 Oklahoma State, and No. 10 UCLA. In addition, other Top 25 teams include No. 13 Georgia Tech, No. 19 Pepperdine, and No. 21 Texas Tech.

Head coach Bruce Heppler’s team begins the spring ranked No. 12 in the nation following a strong fall in which the Yellow Jackets won the Olympia Fields/Illini Invitational and took first place in the stroke play portion of the East Lake Cup, and finished in the top half of strong fields at the Visit Knoxville Collegiate, Ben Hogan Collegiate Invitational and Golf Club of Georgia Collegiate Invitational.

Four of the six players who helped Tech advance to the semifinals of match play in the NCAA Championship last May have returned, led by junior Hiroshi Tai (Singapore), who won the individual title. Also back are redshirt junior Benjamin Reuter (Naarden, The Netherlands), who led the Jackets in stroke average in the fall after sitting out the 2023-24 year, sophomores Kale Fontenot (Lafayette, La.) and Carson Kim (Yorba Linda, Calif.) and junior Aidan Tran (Fresno, Calif.).

The tournament will utilize a shotgun start format each day, with competition beginning at 7:30 a.m. local time (12:30 p.m. Eastern time) each day. The event began in 1991 as the Taylor Made Big Island Intercollegiate before being renamed the Amer Ari Intercollegiate in 2010 after a longtime UH-Hilo supporter.

Benjamin Reuter enters the spring as Tech’s highest-ranked player nationally at No. 30. (photo by Clyde Click)

TECH LINEUP – Reuter and Tai lead the five-man lineup for the Yellow Jackets in Hawai’i, joined by Fontenot, Kim and freshman Albert Hansson (Fiskebäckskil, Sweden).

Reuter was Tech’s top player this fall, posting a runner-up finish at Olympia Fields, a tie for 14^th at the Ben Hogan and a tie for 15^th at the Golf Club of Georgia Collegiate Invitational. He is ranked No. 27 in the…