Men’s Golf

Following last week’s comeback victory at the Windon Memorial, Northwestern hoped to carry its momentum into the Marquette Intercollegiate over the weekend. 

The Wildcats appeared to be riding high in the first two rounds, where they amassed a six-stroke lead. The turn of the final round, however, signaled a change in the tide that NU could not reverse. Leading into the round, No. 3 Auburn, sat six strokes back in third position, but the Tigers posted a tournament-best round at 274, flying up the leaderboard and supplanting NU for the title. 

“(There were) definitely a lot of lessons learned from what we could’ve done a bit better at the finish,” coach David Inglis said.

The Cats shot a six-over 286 in the third round to finish 11-over on the event. On a course as difficult as Milwaukee Country Club, there are positive takeaways from a co-runner-up finish. Graduate student and reigning Big Ten individual champion David Nyfjäll tied for second at two-under on the tournament. 

Alongside Nyfjäll — one of four players to finish under-par at the event — senior James Imai and junior Chris Zhang both shot five-over. Senior John Driscoll III and sophomore Cameron Adam shot six-over and seven-over, respectively.

“We can certainly feel like we played well enough to win, (but) looking over the two days I felt our putting in particular (was lacking) — we just had so many three-putts,” Inglis said. “That will be a point of focus in practice these next couple of weeks.” 

Freshman Daniel Svärd, the sixth man on the rotation, earned his first collegiate top-10 finish as an individual. Svärd shot two-over on the tournament, including a team-best two-under in the final round, which earned him a share of sixth place. 

Inglis said the 6-foot-5 Swede played his way back into the starting lineup. 

“We’ve got a good team, we’ve got a deep squad, which means a lot of good players,” Inglis said. “Everybody every week is going to have to go out and play their way to earn a spot in the lineup because the reality is — with (Svärd) playing well — he’s going to earn an exemption at the next one.” 

NU has two weeks of practice before it heads to Florida to play in the Quail Valley Collegiate Invitational Oct. 16 and 17. While the course is known for being much more forgiving than the Milwaukee Country Club, NU needs a strong offensive showing to compete for hardware. 

“We’re going to get the scoring clubs sharp, and that will also be kind of the focus on practices, just kind of getting primed and ready to go low once we get to Florida,” Inglis said. “If we take care of business and play the way we know how to play, we should have a good chance to be challenging for the title.”

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Related Stories:

— Men’s Golf: Historic third round carries Northwestern to Windon Memorial Classic title

— Men’s Golf: David Nyfjäll takes home individual title, Northwestern places fourth at Big Ten Championship

— Men’s Golf: Northwestern’s season ends with eleventh-place finish in NCAA Regionals