Coming off of a win at the ASU Thunderbird Invitational, the ASU men's golf team's fifth win on the season, the Sun Devils will look to continue their dominance in California for the 2015 Annual Western Intercollegiate hosted by San Jose State.
There is not a team in the nation that is as hot as the Sun Devils right now and it’s going to be important for the team to keep that heat on this weekend, as it is the last chance for the team to showcase itself before the Pac-12 Championships in Pullman, Washington, later this month.
The team has not finished outside the top five in any tournament since finishing sixth at its first event of the season in September. In a stretch of events in January and February, ASU won three straight tournaments including shooting a 31-under-par 833 at The Prestige tournament.
After having that streak broken at the Southern Highlands Collegiate where they finished in third place, the team has started another streak winning their last two events. They won the Oregon Duck Invitational by six strokes finishing 1-under 863 as a team and followed it up with a big win at the Thunderbird tournament winning by 25 strokes.
If the team is the hottest in the nation, then junior Jon Rahm is undoubtedly the hottest individual player in the nation right now.
Rahm has won each of the last two events, both times beating his teammate junior Max Rottluff by just one stroke (which may make Rottluff the second hottest individual players in the nation right now). Rahm currently holds the best season stroke average in Sun Devil history with a 68.63 average. Rottluff is close behind with a 68.97 average. For context, Sun Devil legend Phil Mickelson’s best season stroke average was 69.95 during the 1991-92 season.
At the event this weekend, the Sun Devils are with two other teams in Golfweek’s top 10, No. 3 Texas and No. 8 Washington and five other teams in the top-25, No. 11 UCLA, No. 13 Stanford, No. 14 Oregon, No. 16 USC and No. 22 California. Also in the field is rival Arizona.
The Cardinal won the event last year shooting 10-under as a team. The Sun Devils finished tied for sixth last year shooting 22-over as a team. Rottluff and then-Sun Devil, now Colorado State Ram Blake Cannon led the team shooting 2-over over the three rounds finishing tied for 18th.
Rahm shot 8-over at last year’s event and finished 45th, it was his worst finish of last season.
Rahm and Rottluff will be in the first and second spots in the lineup this weekend as per usual. Also in the lineup this weekend for ASU will be sophomore Nicolo Galletti, junior Alberto Sanchez, senior Ben Shur and sophomore Ki Taek Lee. Lee will be playing as an individual as he did at the Thunderbird tournament where he recorded his first top-10 finish of the season finishing eighth shooting an even 210.
Reach the reporter at wslane@asu.edu or follow @bill_slane on Twitter.
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