LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — The LSU men’s golf team will participate in the 2002 NCAA Central Regional on May 16-18 at the Pleasant Valley Country Club in Little Rock, Ark.
The regional begins on Thursday with the first round at the par 72, 7,103 yd. course. The Tigers, the No. 11 seed in the region, will tee off at 12:18 p.m. Thursday and are paired with No. 10 seed and Southeastern Conference rival Alabama and 12th-seeded Tulsa.
The central regional features 27 teams, of which 10 will advance to the 2002 NCAA Championships on May 29-June 1 at Columbus, Ohio, and six individuals from teams that did not qualify for the regional. Two of the six individuals will advance to the championships from each of the three regions. The East Regional will be played at Roswell, Ga., while the West will be played at Albuquerque, N. M.
LSU will go with a lineup of senior Nathan Goulding, juniors Garrett Prather and John Humphries, redshirt freshman Jason Horrell and true freshman Heath West. Goulding and West were both named Second-Team All-SEC last week by the league. Horrell, West and Prather will each make their first-career NCAA regional appearance.
The Tigers are coming off of a fourth-place finish at the SEC Championships last month at Sea Island, Ga. West and Humphries both placed in the top 10 for LSU, with West tying for fifth and Humphries eighth. LSU improved on their eighth-place finish from a season ago, and was in contention for the title as late as round two of the tournament.
“We have had some good practices lately and we feel that we are ready to go to this regional and give it our best shot,” said LSU head coach Greg Jones. “We are really happy to be included in the field and look forward to doing our best this weekend.”
LSU finished in a tie for 19th place at the East Regional a season ago at Williamsburg, Va. The Tigers last appearance at the NCAA Championships was in 1997 after participating at the East Regional at Lake Forest, Ill.
The Central Regional will be feature live scoring for the three-day event and can be found on the GolfStat web site at www.golfstatlive.com.