BATON ROUGE – After taking home their third team championship of the 2014-15 season at the Talis Park Challenge last week, the No. 9-ranked LSU Men’s Golf team returns to the state of Florida to continue their spring momentum with an appearance at this year’s Valspar Invitational at Floridian beginning Monday at Floridian Golf Club in Palm City.
Hosted by the University of Houston, the Valspar Invitational at Floridian has attracted many of the NCAA’s premier men’s programs from across the country as 13 teams will battle one another for 54 holes in two days of competition for the right to take home the title in one of the top tournaments of the 2015 spring season.
Monday’s opener kicks off with a shotgun start at 8 a.m. CT followed by the start of Tuesday’s final round with tee times at 7:30 a.m. as Floridian Golf Club will play to a par 72 and 7,114 yards for the event.
The Tigers are in great form as they return to the state of Florida just one week after taking home their third team title of the season at the Talis Park Challenge held at Talis Park Golf Club in Naples just last week. LSU’s winning 14-under par 838 was good for a four-shot victory over Vanderbilt as they added to the titles won at the Golfweek Conference Challenge and David Toms Intercollegiate in the 2014 fall season.
The Tigers will tee off at the Valspar Invitational at Floridian as high as the No. 9-ranked team nationally in the latest Golfweek Men’s Collegiate Team Rankings released Thursday. They’re also tied as the No. 12-ranked team in the country in the Bushnell Golfweek Coaches’ Top 25 Poll and the No. 14-ranked team in collegiate golf in the latest Golfstat power rankings released Wednesday.
LSU is among five top-10, eight top-25 and 10 top-50 teams nationally in the Golfweek Men’s Collegiate Team Rankings making the trip to Floridian Golf Club to compete at the Valspar Invitational at Floridian.
The Tigers will compete alongside the likes of No. 1-ranked Illinois, No. 2-ranked Florida State, No. 5-ranked Georgia Tech, No. 7-ranked UCLA, No. 13-ranked South Carolina, No. 18-ranked South Florida, No. 21-ranked Oklahoma State, No. 33-ranked Houston and No. 47-ranked Texas A&M this week. Rounding out the 13-team field are Kent State, Memphis and Tennessee.
Georgia Tech swept titles at the Valspar Invitational at Floridian a year ago as the Yellow Jackets fired a 15-under par 837 for three rounds en route to a decisive eight-shot victory over runner-up Oklahoma State for the 2014 edition of the championship. Georgia Tech’s Ollie Schniederjans also returns to defend the individual crown he won by two shots over LSU’s Stewart Jolly a year ago with a winning score of 12-under par 201.
With Floridian Golf Club playing to a par 71 a year ago, Jolly fired a 10-under par 203 to propel the Tigers to a strong fourth-place team finish among the 15 teams in the field as they posted a 5-under par 847 in 54 holes.
LSU is paired with Oklahoma State and South Florida in Monday’s opener as they will play 36 holes with a shotgun start set for 8 a.m. CT. Golfstat will provide live scoring of the event online at http://golfstat.com.
Fresh off their victory at the Talis Park Challenge a week ago, the Tigers look to build consistency down the stretch as they return their same lineup that claimed their third championship of the campaign as Jolly is set to be joined once again by fellow senior All-American Ben Taylor, junior Zach Wright and sophomores Brandon Pierce and Eric Ricard in Palm City.
Jolly finished runner-up to Schniederjans at the Valspar Invitational at Floridian a year ago to help propel him to All-America honors for the first time in his collegiate career. He has won one tournament title and earned a pair of top-10 finishes in his six starts for the Tigers this season, posting a 72.28 scoring average as he makes his return to Floridian Golf Club on Monday and Tuesday.
Taylor and Ricard each cracked the Top 10 of the leaderboard as they tied one another for eighth place overall to lead the Tigers to victory at the Talis Park Challenge, firing matching scores of 3-under par 210 in 54 holes last week. Taylor boasts a 71.89 scoring average while earning three top-10 finishes in six tournament starts this year, while Ricard follows closely behind with a 71.85 scoring average with a team-leading four Top 10s as the only squad member to appear in each of LSU’s seven tournaments for the 2014-15 season.
Pierce has been on fire since cracking LSU’s lineup for the first time in 2015 as he leads the Tigers with a 70.78 stroke average in three starts, including one top-10 and three top-20 finishes for the spring season.
Wright has also finished among the Top 20 of the leaderboard in each of his six tournament appearances for the Tigers this season, including his first top-10 finish of the campaign at the Querencia Cabo Collegiate as he tied for 10th place on the leaderboard to open the month of March. He will tee off this week with a 72.11 scoring average in his six starts on the campaign.
After competing against many of the nation’s top teams at the Valspar Invitational at Floridian this week, the Tigers will wrap up their regular season as the defending team champions at Texas A&M’s Aggie Invitational being held April 4-5 at Traditions Golf Club in Bryan, Texas. LSU tied tournament host Texas A&M for the team title in the 2014 spring season with a winning score of 35-over par 899.