ALBANY, Ga. – Playing their best golf of the fall, the Lee University men's golf team placed second in the Hurricane Invitational which was hosted and won by Georgia Southwestern University with a 54-hole total of 867. After a slow start, the Flames came battling back in the final 36 holes and finished with a 6-over par 870. The event was staged at the Doublegate Country Club. North Georgia (872), Lander (880) and West Florida (881) rounded out the top five.
Golf is known as an individual sport, but in this tournament all five Lee players had a hand in the second-place finish. Sophomore George Cordall got the ball rolling when he fired the lowest round of the entire event, a 5-under 67. Red-shirt junior teammate Trey Melvin followed with a 4-under 68, and senior Noah Ross carded an even-par 72. Suddenly in the second round, Lee had made the jump all the way up from eighth place to the second spot in the strong 15 team field.
There were even more fireworks on Tuesday. Senior Oliver-Lewis Perkins displayed why he was a main force over the past two years for the Flames when he posted a smooth 2-under 70. His round included birdies on holes 6 and 7 on the front side and nothing but pars on the back. It was a different story for Bennett McNabb on his way to a 1-under 71. The red-shirt sophomore had five total birdies, a bogie and a double bogie in his wild round. Cordall and Melvin finished tied for fifth (217). Noah Ross followed with an even-par in round two and 221. Perkins tallied 222 and McNabb rounded out the team scoring 223.
Marco Trstenjak of Georgia Southwestern won medalist honors with a final round of 71 and a 214 total. Ludvig Eriksson of Lander and Blake Henriques of Shorter tied for second (215) and Erik Fogel of Georgia Southwestern was fourth (216) ahead of the next two Flames.
Lee will move on to Palm Harbor, Fla. next Monday and Tuesday and take part in the annual Copperhead Championship hosted by the University of West Florida. The 54-hole event will close out the fall season for the Flames.
Coach Evan Spence's thoughts:
"This week was a huge step in the right direction for us as a team. I was extremely proud of the performances from George (Cordall) and Trey (Melvin) this week, especially in the second-round yesterday afternoon. The 67 and 68 from those guys on the firm greens were highly impressive and kept us in the hunt coming into the final round.
"Today, it was great to see Ollie (Lewis-Perkins) and Bennett (McNabb) bounce back with red numbers and help push us up the leaderboard to a solo second. Obviously, we are playing to win every week and would have loved to be able to get the win today, but it felt awesome just to be back in the hunt and we will take some great positives from this week."
"Over the past several weeks away from competition, we took a long look at everything and ultimately tweaked the way we were practicing and preparing on a daily basis. In an effort to introduce more competition and intensity into our day-to-day grind, it was great to see some of that come to fruition for us this week. This was easily the toughest I've seen us compete in tournament play from top to bottom this season. I'm excited as we get to keep this momentum rolling straight into next week."
