BATON ROUGE – LSU All-American Zach Wright has taken a big step toward qualifying for Team USA’s roster that will compete at the Arnold Palmer Cup this summer after moving up seven spots as the 11t -ranked American in college golf in the latest Arnold Palmer Cup Ranking released Thursday by the Golf Coaches Association of America.
The top six golfers in the final ranking to be released on April 15 from both the United States and Europe will be among the individuals selected to compete in this summer’s Palmer Cup being held June 24-26 at Formby Golf Club in Formby, Merseyside, England.
The Arnold Palmer Cup Ranking uses Golfstat’s NCAA Player Ranking as its base for ranking the Top 25 Americans and Top 25 Europeans while awarding bonus points for wins and high finishes and negative points for poor finishes in amateur events. The ranking also uses a strength of schedule component as part of its biweekly calculations.
Wright is currently the No. 18-ranked player in college golf regardless of nationality in the latest Golfstat power rankings released Tuesday in the wake of two spring appearances for the Tigers.
A Second-Team All-SEC selection and PING Honorable Mention All-American a year ago, Wright is in the midst of another All-American season as a senior in 2015-16 as the team’s top performer to date. He opened this spring season with a two-shot victory at The Prestige at PGA West where he won his second career individual title with a career-low score of 12-under par 201 for 54 holes. Wright leads the Tigers with his three top-five and four top-10 finishes this season while posting a team-low scoring average of 71.29 strokes per round.
Arnold Palmer Cup Ranking (as of March 17)
United States
Player, School, Percentage
1. Beau Hossler, Texas, 1.0000
2. Maverick McNealy, Stanford, .9989
3. Robby Shelton, Alabama, .9974
4. Rico Hoey, Southern California, .9968
5. Michael Johnson, Auburn, .9963
6. Charlie Danielson, Illinois, .9947
7. Hank Lebioda, Florida State, .9920
8. Stephen Behr, Clemson, .9888
9. Austin Eoff, Purdue, .9857
10. Tyler McDaniel, Kentucky, .9856
11. Zach Wright, LSU, .9856
12. Nahum Mendoza III, San Diego State, .9856
13. David Kocher, Maryland, .9852
14. Greyson Sigg, Georgia, .9846
15. Aaron Wise, Oregon, .9841
16. Will Zalatoris, Wake Forest, .9829
17. Patrick Martin, Vanderbilt, .9824
18. Dylan Meyer, Illinois, .9803
19. Adam Wood, Duke, .9787
20. Matthew NeSmith, South Carolina, .9772
21. Austin Langdale, Clemson, .9765
22. Jonah Texeira, Southern California, .9761
23. Chase Koepka, South Florida, .9761
24. Corey Pereira, Washington, .9756
25. Will Gordon, Vanderbilt, .9755
Europe
Player, School, Country, Percentage
1. Sam Horsfield, Florida, England, .9979
2. Lars van Meijel, Memphis, The Netherlands, .9920
3. Thomas Perrot, Memphis, France, .9899
4. Matthias Schwab, Vanderbilt, Austria, .9872
5. Adrian Meronk, East Tennessee State, Poland, .9846
6. Antoine Rozner, Missouri-Kansas City, France, .9830
7. Aksel Olsen, South Florida, Norway, .9793
8. Riccardo Michelini, San Diego State, Italy, .9691
9. David Boote, Stanford, Wales, .9664
10. Thomas Detry, Illinois, Belgium, .9627
11. Robin Petersson, Augusta, Sweden, .9597
12. Robin Sciot-Siegrist, Louisville, France, .9590
13. Paul McBride, Wake Forest, Ireland, .9578
14. Max Rottluff, Arizona State, Germany, .9472
15. Martin Eriksson, McNeese State, Sweden, .9442
16. Jeremy Paul, Colorado, Germany, .9339
17. Hannes Ronneblad, Texas Tech, Sweden, .9319
18. Tom Harris, Maryland, England, .9218
19. Haraldur Magnus, Louisiana-Lafayette, Iceland, .9214
20. Franck Medale, Jacksonville, France, .9190
21. Freddy Andersen, Baylor, Denmark, .9157
22. J.J. Grey, Georgia State, England, .9072
23. Adria Arnaus, Texas A&M, Spain, .9059
24. Ryan Cornfield, USC-Upstate, .9056
25. Andreas Gjesteby, Baylor, Norway, .9029