Feb. 14, 2010
HOUSTON - Louisiana Tech will open its spring golf season Monday and Tuesday as the Bulldog compete in the 10th Annual Rice Intercollegiate presented by Srixon and hosted at Westwood Golf Club.
Head coach Jeff Parks team will compete in the 15-team field that is highlighted by 45th ranked Rice, 53rd ranked Auburn, 59th ranked New Orleans and 97th ranked Nebraska.
The Bulldogs are the fifth highest ranked team in the event as LA Tech is ranked 104th in the country. Other participating teams include 112th ranked Pacific, 116th ranked Kansas, 123rd ranked Houston, 126th ranked Miami (OH), 181st ranked Missouri State, 193rd ranked Northern Colorado, 205th ranked Hartford and 209th ranked UL-Monroe.
Florida Gulf Coast and Houston Baptist - who are both unranked - round out the field of 15 which will begin play Monday morning with an 8:15 a.m. shotgun start. Monday will consist of 36 holes while the event will conclude Tuesday with the third and final round.
Westwood Golf Club is located just minutes away from the Rice campus and has the distinction of being the second oldest private golf club in Houston. The par 72 course covers 7,184 yards is simply, clean and classic as it is shaped by hardwood oaks, lakes and a natural ravine that defines the fairways and greens.
Former Bulldog golfer Amrith de Soysa captured the individual title of this event in 2008, shooting a three-round total of 217. Pacific captured the team title last year while San Francisco's Ji Hwan Park was the individual champion with a 210.
The Bulldogs are coming off a fall season which saw the team's ranking climb as high as 99th nationally as five of the 10 players on the Tech roster recorded rounds in the 60's. Tech's roster consists of only one senior in Matthew Harvey as the Bulldogs boast one of the younger teams in the country.
Harvey, who was the first Bulldog to ever earn All-WAC accolades when he received the honor in 2008, was one of four Tech players to earn a top 10 finish in the fall. As impressive as that fact is for Tech, the most exciting part of it is that three of the four players who recorded the top 10 finishes this fall are either freshmen or sophomores.
LA Tech also posted wins over a number of top 100 teams during the fall season, including defeating 27th ranked Northwestern at the David Toms Intercollegiate.
For all the latest on the Bulldog golf team and all of Louisiana Tech's Athletic programs, log onto www.latechsports.com.
