The short game didn’t help the ASU men’s golf team at all at the Kikkor Golf Husky Invitational at Bremerton, Wash.
ASU finished 37-over-par and wound up in eighth place out of the 15 competing schools. Coach Tim Mickelson was not pleased with his team’s results.
“I don’t feel good about it (the finish) to be honest,” Mickelson said. “I’m disappointed. Again, I feel like we’re underachieving. At some point the guys are going to have to make the adjustment to play better, otherwise we’re going to be in the same position we were in last year (missing the postseason).
“(The) middle of this pack is not good enough (for us), it’s not up to my standards, and we probably should have finished no worse than fourth at this event.”
In particular, the Sun Devils’ futility from close range caused their score to balloon by around 20 strokes, maybe even more.
“Our short game was really bad to put it nicely,” Mickelson said. “Our guys were not prepared for (the) fast greens. They were not prepared to chip or putt on these greens and that probably cost us about 20 shots, if not more.”
While 20 strokes is a lot to make up, it took ASU 901 shots to finish the three-day event, not counting the drop score. Twenty fewer strokes would have launched the Sun Devils into a tie for third place overall.
Mickelson then added that the greens were faster in Washington because their courses are over seeded. The golf courses ASU practices on are too hot right now to over seed.
Mickelson said the grass couldn’t be cut low enough here to allow the greens to be fast enough because doing so would kill the grass.
Mickelson said that the grass length still wasn’t a good enough excuse because the team had two days of practice in Washington, yet the team failed to adjust.
Freshman Jon Rahm led ASU at 5-over, placing 15th. Fellow freshman Alberto Sanchez shot 9-over in his first appearance as a Sun Devil.
Sophomore Mathias Schjoelberg carded an 11-over tournament, while junior Spencer Lawson and freshman Max Rottluff finished 13-over.
ASU collectively played remarkably consistent, although not consistently well. Each single round score from the five golfers fell into a range of 73 to 78 on the par-72 course.
Notes
- Sophomore Austin Quick, senior Chris Russo, and freshman Trey Kaahanui competed as individuals in an entirely different invitational than the rest of the team during the two days.
They played at the same venue, but at a different golf course, Mickelson said.
- According to a press release, Quick shot 5-over and finished 10th in that tournament. Russo was 15-over and Kaahanui 29-over.
Reach the reporter at Justin.Janssen@asu.edu
