CARLSBAD, California \u2013 \u201cTigers never quit.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was part of LSU Coach Jake Amos\u2019 message to his team prior to what appeared to be the final round of the season when LSU teed off here Sunday in the third round of the NCAA Division I Men\u2019s Golf Championship at the OMNI La Costa Resort & Spa North Course.<\/p>\n
The Tigers were T27, 20-over par after two rounds, and 16 shots behind the number at the 15 spot (+4) for the first cut after 54 holes.<\/p>\n
What happened by the time early evening fell in the Pacific Time Zone was one of the most improbable comebacks by an LSU team in several years.<\/p>\n
LSU posted the best round of the day by nine shots, posting an 18-under par 270 to move up 15 places at the end of the round to a tie for 12th place at 2-over par 866 and a spot in the final round of the championships on Monday afternoon.<\/p>\n
The most stunned team had to be Pepperdine which since early afternoon had stood in 15th place at 4-over par for 54 holes. The Waves would finish in 16th place as LSU tied with San Diego, Tennessee and Stanford for 12th<\/p>\n
The amazing total of 18-under topped the school record mark for an NCAA Championship of 11-under par 277 in 2017 in round two at Sugar Grove, Illinois (Rich Harvest Farms Golf Club).<\/p>\n
And leading the charge was England freshman Dan Hayes, who spurred by a rallying par after hitting in the water on his ninth hole of the day (the par 5 18th), birdied 5-of-the-last-6 holes to shoot an 8-under round of 64.<\/p>\n
Hayes not only moved up 84 spots on the leaderboard to T32 at 1-under 215, he posted the lowest NCAA Tournament round in school history, topping the mark of 65 (-7) by John Peterson in the 2011 championships in Stillwater, Oklahoma.<\/p>\n
How wild and ridiculous was this comeback?<\/p>\n
\u201cI might be at a loss for words,\u201d said Coach Amos. \u201cWe talked about just not quitting, and we kind of tried to play the golf course in different sections. Get off to hot start, survive 12 through 14, and we did that. It is just kind of the proudest I\u2019ve ever been of any team. I booked our flights before the round. I\u2019m just gonna tell you. But our message, seriously, was let\u2019s just see what we can do. No pressure just be super aggressive. I think we were tentative in round one and we weren\u2019t really clicking. Tigers don\u2019t quit and we didn\u2019t. We finally showed the firepower this team has.\u201d<\/p>\n
The five LSU players in the play 5-count 4 format of college golf posted a combined 12-under par on holes 10-18 to start the day. This was the same nine holes that LSU started on in the first round on Friday and the five players posted 12-over par.<\/p>\n
Hayes was 3-under par after eight holes, but his ninth hole, the par 5 18th was not looking good after a water ball. But a strong approach and short one putt gave him a par 5 and momentum heading to the front nine.<\/p>\n
It all clicked for Hayes as he posted birdies on the fourth, fifth, par 5 sixth and seventh, before a great approach on the difficult ninth gave him a score of 31 on the final nine (Holes 1-9) and the school mark.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve seen how good (Dan Hayes) has been all year and he\u2019s been literally just waiting for a round like that,\u201d said Coach Amos. \u201cI\u2019m delighted he got it today.<\/p>\n
\u201cComing down 18 (his ninth hole of the day), I made par with a seven iron for my fourth shot. I think that was when I kind of knew, I could take it low. I\u2019ve been playing fine all week. I just knew we needed to make birdies. We were terrible the first round. I think everyone will say it, and we just knew we had to go low, and I think today there was no holding back. Like we had nothing to lose, and we know how good we are. Every single one of us can shoot seven, eight under, so when it all clicks, it clicks.\u201d Said Hayes.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s never had a low one yet,\u201d said Amos. \u201cFor him to finish it off in the biggest stage, a course record at La Costa, that\u2019s going to be tough to beat. Not only that, it was in the afternoon. I could see a course record in the morning where it\u2019s softer and no wind, but he played it in the teeth of the wind and that was awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n
The seventh-ranked Tigers brought it from all corners as Jay Mendell posted a 4-under 68 to move up 41 places in the standings and Matty Dodd-Berry and Arni Sveinsson both had 3-under par 69s. Mendell moved up 41 spots and Dodd-Berry 30 to finish 54 holes at T47 even par. Sveinsson moved up 44 spots.<\/p>\n
LSU as a team had 28 birdies, led by the nine by Hayes. Mendell and Sveinsson each had six, Dodd-Berry 4 and Noah McWilliams 3. LSU has 53 birdies for the first three rounds, T5, in the 30-team field. LSU is T4 on par 3 holes at 3.03 (+2) and Hayes is the tournament leader on the par 4s at 3.77 (-7).<\/p>\n
Even more impressively, after this comeback the Tigers are only three shots out of eighth place, which will be the cut after Monday\u2019s round at 1-under par by Duke. Coach Amos now has to get his troops ready to go again.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, we\u2019ve got the game plan already,\u201d he said. \u201cJust do the same again. The biggest thin now is just making sure our energy is good. Probably go to \u2018In-and-Out\u201d burger again, same meal we had yesterday, and just try and keep the same energy going.\u201d<\/p>\n
No. 1 Auburn is the tournament leader at 22-under par, three shots up on Texas and its 10 shots back to Vanderbilt at -9.<\/p>\n
LSU will start on hole 10 again on Monday at 10:41 Pacific Time, 12:41 p.m. Baton Rouge time.<\/p>\n
The final round will be televised over-the-air by The Golf Channel beginning at 2:30 p.m. PT (4:30 p.m. Baton Rouge time). Live scoring is available at Scoreboard.clippd.com.<\/p>\n
NCAA DIVISION I MEN\u2019S GOLF CHAMPIONSHIP
Carlsbad, California \u2013 OMNI La Costa Resort & Spa North Course
Third Round Team Results \u2013 Par 288-864
Top 15 advance to play on Monday
1 Auburn \u2013 284-272-286 \u2013 842 (-22)
2 Texas \u2013 287-277-281 \u2013 845 (-19)
3 Vanderbilt \u2013 287-277-291 \u2013 855 (-9)
T4 UCLA \u2013 280-289-287 \u2013 856 (-8)
T4 Arizona \u2013 287-285-284 \u2013 856 (-8)
T4 Oklahoma State \u2013 295-274-287 \u2013 856 (-8)
7 North Carolina \u2013 287-288-283 \u2013 858 (-6)
8 Duke \u2013 286-286-291 \u2013 863 (-1)
9 Oklahoma \u2013 292-284-288 \u2013 864 (E)
T10 Virginia \u2013 288-284-293 \u2013 865 (+1)
T10 Florida \u2013 291-290-284 \u2013 865 (+1)
T12 LSU \u2013 303-293-270 \u2013 866 (+2)
T12 San Diego \u2013 286-291-289 \u2014 866 (+2)
T12 Tennessee 292-287-287 \u2014 866 (+2)
T12 Stanford 291-286-289 \u2014 866 (+2)
\u2014
16 Pepperdine \u2013 868 (+4)
17 Mississippi State \u2013 871 (+7)
18 BYU \u2013 873 (+9)
19 Arkansas \u2013 874 (+10)
20 Georgia \u2013 876 (+12)
21 Arizona State \u2014 877 (+13)
22 Arkansas State \u2014 879 (+15)
23 Purdue \u2014 880 (+16)
24 Louisville \u2013 881 (+17)
25 Texas A&M \u2013 882 (+18)
T26 Ole Miss \u2013 884 (+20)
T26 Chattanooga \u2013 884 (+20)
28 Memphis \u2013 887 (+23)
29 Southern California \u2013 890 (+26)
30 Florida State \u2013 899 (+35)<\/p>\n
LSU Scores
T32 Dan Hayes \u2013 76-75-64 \u2013 215 -1
T47 Matty Dodd-Berry \u2013 75-72-69 \u2013 216 E
T47 Jay Mendell \u2013 75-73-68 \u2013 216 E
T72 Arni Sveinsson \u2013 77-74-69 \u2013 220 +4
T127 Noah McWilliams \u2013 78-74-74 \u2013 226 +10<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CARLSBAD, California \u2013 \u201cTigers never quit.\u201d That was part of LSU Coach Jake Amos\u2019 message to his team…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12347,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[235,44,237,238,236,234,233,113,255],"class_list":["post-12346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-geaux-tigers","tag-golf","tag-homepage-feature-headline","tag-latest-news","tag-louisiana","tag-louisiana-state-university","tag-lsu","tag-lsu-tigers","tag-men-s-golf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12346\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}