Tiger Golf Team Will Start Regional Play Sunday As NCAA Amherst Regional Adjusts Schedule
NOTE: Due to weather concerns, the NCAA Regional in Amherst, Virginia will now start on Sunday afternoon after the practice round in the morning.
BATON ROUGE – The LSU Tigers golf team went to the SEC Championship in St. Simons Island looking for a No. 1 NCAA regional seed and they acquired it by finishing a solid second in the stroke play portion of the championship.
LSU moved to No. 6 in the NCAA Scoreboard by Clippd performance rankings and the Tigers are now the No. 1 seed at the NCAA Amherst (Virginia) Regional that now will begin Sunday afternoon at the Poplar Grove Golf Club in Amherst.
With heavy rain expected to move in on Monday with a 98 percent chance of rain which is also at 97 percent on Tuesday and 60 percent on Wednesday according to weather.com, NCAA officials are trying to find a way to get 54 holes in by the end of the day on Wednesday. NCAA rules allow now for an early start to tournament play if needed.
The teams will play their practice round in a shotgun format early Sunday morning with the championship now scheduled to begin at 1:45 p.m. ET (12:45 p.m. Baton Rouge time).
The Tigers as the No. 1 seed will be the first group off the first tee and will have the opportunity to get very close, if not finished with their round if the forecast for Sunday holds with sunset at 8:15 p.m. ET.
The field for the regional in seed order with their NCAA Scoreboard by Clippd ranking (conference listed for league champions):
1 #6 LSU
2 #7 Oklahoma
3 #18 Vanderbilt
4 #19 19 Pepperdine (West Coast Conference)
5 #30 Tennessee
6 #31 Arizona
7 #42 Stanford
8 #43 Wake Forest
9 #55 Arkansas
10 #56 Florida Gulf Coast
11 #78 Kent State (Mid-American Conference)
12 #82 Princeton (The Ivy League)
13 #252 Howard (Northeast Conference)
The six NCAA regionals that will also be conducted through Wednesday will send five teams to the NCAA Championships at Carlsbad, California’s Omni La Costa Resort & Spa starting on May 23.
Earlier this week before the team left on Friday, first-year Tiger coach Jake Amos talked about being the No. 1 seed and setting up for the NCAA regional.
“The stroke play in the SEC is strange because you just need to finish top eight, but we were trying to play great so we could jump up to a one seed. That was a goal of ours,” said Coach Amos. “And we did it and the guys played great there in stroke play.
“We’re all in a really good spot. Everyone’s playing really nice. In the team meeting (Thursday) morning, it’s not very often, as a coach, you can truly say any one of your guys could win it individually. I think we’ve shown that with how many wins we’ve had individually this year. It’s pretty amazing that genuinely one through five could win it and I think that’s cool. As long as we focus on that, our team is going to be just fine.”
The Tigers in the 2024-25 wraparound calendar has five individual wins to go with four team wins, including two notable wins at The Blessings Collegiate in Fayetteville and the Pauma Valley Classic against a stacked field in California.
The Tigers were 29 under par for the 54 holes in the SEC Championships and is averaging 280.42 for the season in the play 5, count 4 format of college golf.
LSU will be led by All-SEC First Team selection and Newcomer of the Year Algot Kleen of Sweden. The senior transfer is averaging 69.90 strokes per round. Only two golfers, Sam Burns (70.047) in 2016-17 and Garrett Barber (70.704) in 2018-19 have averaged below 71 strokes a round for an entire season since the 1978-79 campaign.
Second Team All-SEC selection Arni Sveinsson is averaging 70.39 with Alfons Bondesson at 70.82 and Jay Mendell at 70.88 strokes per round. Rounding out the Tigers lineup is Matthew Dodd-Berry at 71.62.
Mendell finished T3 in the SEC Championships at 9-under par 201 (66-65-70), while Bondesson posted 69-67-67 for 7-under 203 to finish T8. Kleen was T11 at 6-under 204 and Dodd-Berry was 5-under 205 at T13.
The weather is just one apparent storyline of the regionals, which are known for their crazy finishes and sometime surprise qualifiers.
“I think we always kind of preach winning in everything we’ve done,” said Coach Amos, “and I think you can see that with how we’ve played this year, individually and as a team. I told them, they give trophies out now at regionals, so why not go get one? I think as long as you focus on winning, I think that’s really the most important thing because it’s going to be a precursor to the national championship.”
The Poplar Grove course will play to a par of 70 and a maximum length of 7,212 yards. The Poplar Grove Golf Club is a Sam Snead and Ed Carton design and was Snead’s final design and is located in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The golf course features spectacular views and well-manicured bent grass tees, fairways, and greens.
That’s one reason the team went up on Friday to play at The Farm in Virginia to get a round or two before the practice round on Sunday on bent grass fairways and greens.
LSU, Oklahoma and Vanderbilt will be together in an All-SEC wave to start the event on Sunday with live scoring available on the Scoreboard.clippd.com link under the NCAA Amherst Regional tab. Updates also on “X” as the round commences @LSUmensgolf and @LSUKent.
NCAA Amherst Regional
First Round Tee Time Waves – Sunday
1:45 p.m. ET – Hole No. 1 – LSU, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt
2:15 p.m. ET – Hole No. 10 – Pepperdine, Tennessee, Arizona
2:40 p.m. ET – Hole No. 1 – Stanford, Wake Forest, Arkansas
3:10 p.m. ET – Hole No. 10 – Florida Gulf Coast, Kent State, Princeton
3:35 p.m. ET – Hole No. 1 – Howard, Individual qualifiers
