Tiger Woods played nowhere near his best golf early at the Masters. Neither did the Northwestern golf team, which shot a disappointing 33-over 317 first round to land in 12th place at the Robert Kepler Intercollegiate hosted by Ohio State.
And as Tiger turned on the jets in crunch time for the final two rounds, so did the Wildcats, recording the lowest second round team score (13-over 297) and the second-lowest final round score (14-over 298) to finish the tournament.
Just like with Tiger, however, the late surge couldn’t secure the win for the Cats, who finished fifth overall. In the end, the team’s poor early play proved too deep a hole for them to dig out of. Still, head coach Pat Goss concentrated on NU’s two good rounds rather than the bad one, saying he felt “encouraged.”
“I would have thought we could have done better than fifth, but after the way we started, we played two very good rounds and made good progress,” Goss said.
NU proved it could hang with other “elite” Big Ten teams, scoring victories over three conference opponents ahead of them in the Golfweek ratings. No. 23 Michigan State and No. 48 Ohio State were the only two Big Ten schools to finish ahead of the Cats – Ohio State by only three strokes.
Senior Kyle Moore led the team with a three-round score of 12-over 225, finishing in a tie for 10th place in the individual standings. While he was happy with the high finish, Moore said he can do better.
“I felt like I wasted a lot of shots out there,” Moore said. “I felt like it could have been a lot better, but it’s encouraging finishing 10th. If I tighten things up, I should be contending a lot more.”
Moore’s solid play was integral to the Cats comeback as they jumped seven places in the final two rounds. In the final rounds, Moore and fellow senior Dan Doyle displayed the senior leadership Goss has said the team needed. Doyle saw his recent struggles continue in the first round, shooting a 14-over 85, but got back on track to shoot consecutive 3-over 74s in the final two rounds.
Although he said he is glad his seniors seem to be getting back on track, Goss continued to criticize their play.
“The problems that came out this week were obviously that Dan Doyle played a horrific first round, an embarrassing first round, but he really rebounded to play great and played very solidly the second and third rounds,” Goss said. “Kyle’s game is still a little sloppy in spots, he made some short game mistakes, some wedge mistakes, but overall his game is solid and he’s competing well.
“Both of those guys have room to get better in the next couple of weeks.”
Playing well the next couple of weeks, first at Purdue’s Boilermaker Invitational and then in the Big Ten championships, will be crucial if NU wants to secure a spot in the NCAA championships. The team is currently one game over .500, the first time the Cats have had a winning record all year. If they can maintain that, Goss said, they should make the tournament.
“We’re on the bubble, but inside the bubble,” Goss said.
