March 22, 2015
SAN DIEGO - Following a 12-day break from competition, the San Diego State men's golf team heads to the Pacific Northwest this week to participate in the Oregon Duck Invitational, March 23-24, in Eugene, Ore. The two-day 54-hole tournament will be contested on the par-72, 7,020-yard Eugene Country Club, which has been chosen as the site for the 2016 NCAA Championships.
The Aztecs are one of 15 teams slated to play in the 26th annual event, which commences on Monday with the first two rounds in a shotgun start at 8:30 a.m. PT, while the final 18 holes are scheduled to be completed on Tuesday. A live scoring link courtesy of Golfstat will be available on GoAztecs.com.
SDSU will square off against three squads ranked in the Golfstat top 20, including No. 4 Arizona State, host school and No. 8 Oregon, along with No. 13 Washington. In addition, the 29th-ranked Aztecs will be afforded an early look at Mountain West rivals Fresno State, Nevada and San José State, while defending champion Oregon State, Gonzaga, Kansas State, Loyola Marymount, Pacific, San Diego, UC Riverside and Utah round out the field.
For the second time this spring, SDSU head coach Ryan Donovan will employ the starting lineup of Xander Schauffele (San Diego, Calif.), Ryann Ree (Redondo Beach, Calif.), Brian Song (Beverly Hills, Calif.), PJ Samiere (Kailua, Hawaii) and Nahum Mendoza III (San Diego, Calif.). The aforementioned quintet previously led the Aztecs to a third-place team finish at The Prestige at PGA West last month with a combined 23-under 841.
Schauffele, who enters the tournament at No. 18 in the latest Golfstat Cup standings, leads the Aztecs with a 70.63 stroke average, which ranks second in the MW. The SDSU senior has posted three top-five finishes in four starts this spring, including an individual title at the Barona Collegiate Cup in early February. For his efforts, Schauffele collected three straight conference golfer-of-the-week awards.
Ree, meanwhile, will be returning to familiar environs this week after playing two seasons at Oregon from 2012-14. The junior transfer, who joined the Aztecs in January, has played in two previous Duck Invitationals, tying for the 20th position in 2014 when he shot a 7-over 223 at Emerald Valley Golf Club. In four events this spring, Ree (71.83) has already logged three top-20 finishes, including an eighth-place tie as an unattached golfer at Barona last month.
As a team, SDSU will be competing at the Duck Invitational for the first time in eight years after making 10 straight appearances from 1999-2008. The Aztecs have had a history of success at the tournament, winning team titles in 2001, 2004, 2006 and 2008, while posting a runner-up finish in 2005. Jeff Hansen (-5, 211) took home medalist honors as a sophomore at the 2004 installment for the Scarlet and Black's highest individual finish in the event since 1999.
After the venturing to Eugene, San Diego State returns to the fairways for the ASU Thunderbird Invitational, April 3-4, at Karsten Golf Course in Tempe, Ariz. The Aztecs last played the event in 2013 when they finished fifth as a team.