For the first and only time this year, the ASU men's and women's golf teams will be playing side by side as they compete in the Hooters Collegiate Match Play Championship at the Mission Inn Golf and Tennis Resort outside Orlando, Fla.
The match play consists of 16 men's and 16 women's teams competing in a bracketed tournament and for both teams will be the only match play style of tournament this season.
"Both teams get to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner together, and it's the only time in the season that we get to do that," ASU men's coach Randy Lein said.
The ASU men's team, coming off a fourth-place finish in last month's Isleworth Collegiate Invitational, begins tournament play Friday seeded sixth against No. 11 seed New Mexico.
Lein said that the team enjoys the opportunity to compete face to face with other golfers in match play.
"The foreign players are used to it, because that's what they play all summer," he said. "But we don't play that style as much in this country so the American golfers love it."
Both the men's and women's tournaments will be played simultaneously with the men competing on the par-72, 6,974-yard El Campeon course, while the women tee off on the par 72, 6,876-yard Las Colinas course.
The women's team received a fourth seed and will square off against No. 13 seed Missouri on Friday.
Lein said that match play brings a different kind of competition out of the golfers.
"In medal play, you're just playing against the golf course, and you have to wait to find out how you did," he said.
"Whereas in match play, you know exactly throughout the round where you stand because you can see your competition."
Reach the reporter at michael.fowler@asu.edu.
