The Ohio State men’s golf team’s three rounds at the NCAA Championships were heavily delayed by bad weather. OSU finished round three Friday morning, placing 25th in coach Jim Brown’s final event.
The Buckeye’s finished the first round tied for sixth Tuesday. After the suspension of the second round because of weather, the Buckeyes finished 27th early Thursday morning. After finishing round two early in the day, OSU had to again battle Inverness in the third round of competition. The third and final round was suspended until dawn Friday.
“We were playing pretty good on Wednesday before the delay,” Brown said. “The next morning, after the delay we just collapsed. It wasn’t pretty coming in that day.”
The Buckeyes were in good position to make it to match play after the first round, but a difficult second round kept OSU from reaching their goal.
“We didn’t finish where we wanted to. We wanted to get into match play,” Brown said. “We beat some good teams. We beat Texas, Wake Forest, Arizona, even defending champs UCLA beat us by one. It wasn’t that bad, but it wasn’t what we wanted.”
Senior Vaughn Snyder and junior Brad Wright led the team carding 223(+10) tying for 70th for the week. Snyder also had the best round for the Buckeyes in round three, shooting a 69(-2) to finish his career.
OSU’s top golfer, sophomore Bo Hoag finished with a 229(+16) placing him in a tie for 120th. Sophomores Michael Cress and Brad Smith tied for 131st with 231(+18).
Brown said the weather could not be used as an excuse for the team’s disappointing finish. However, of the 14 teams who faced the same delays as the Buckeyes, only one of those teams qualified for the match play portion of the championship.
While the Buckeyes didn’t finish where they had hoped, Brown said this team gained valuable experience with four of five guys returning next season.
“I wanted to leave the program in a good place,” Brown said. “We have recruiting two or three really good players for next year that should help the team. I look for them to be real strong next year and the next couple years.”
Brown finished his 36th and final year as the coach of the Buckeyes. He led his team to their first NCAA berth since 1998.
He leaves OSU with a national title in 1979, along with a conference record 17 Big Ten Championships.
