COLLEGEVILLE, Pa. – After a string of seventh-place finishes at the Centennial Conference championship, the Ursinus College men's golf team plans to exceed expectations when the Bears take their swings over the three-day weekend event held at The Bridges Golf Club in Abbottstown, Pennsylvania.
The Bears have finished at the bottom of the leaderboard in each of their last seven appearances at the conference tournament dating back to 2009. Ursinus will enter Friday's first round with the highest stroke average in the CC (336.33), but the potential is there to outperform the projected standings. Franklin & Marshall (305.00), Gettysburg (307.13), Muhlenberg (310.50), McDaniel (312.44), and Swarthmore (313.40) are tightly bunched, with Dickinson (331.82) and the Bears rounding out the field.
Sophomore Lamar Saxon has been the Bears' most consistent performer this season. He has led the team in scoring each of the last three tournaments and ranks 15th in the conference with a 78.13 stroke average. Saxon boasts a low round of 734, set during the second day of the fall Revolutionary Collegiate Classic; that marked one of four sub-80 rounds for the sophomore, who fired a 76 at the Rosemont Spring Invitational on April 10.
Saxon will be joined in the Bears' championship lineup by senior Matthew Holmes, junior Anthony Barbine, sophomore Ryan Crawford, and freshman Bennett Collins.
Crawford and Barbine have conference tournament experience; the former fired a three-day 277 at last year's event, while Barbine carded a 285. Barbine holds a low round of 82 this season, and Crawford shot a 79 at the Rosemont Invitational.
Holmes has scored an 85 or lower in all three of his completed rounds this spring, including an 81 at the Eastern Spring Invitational on April 3. Collins shot an 80 on two separate occasions this year, including the Rosemont Invitational.
Ursinus tied for the tournament crown in 1997 and finished runner-up in both 1996 and 2000. The Bears' last top-four showing came in 2003, when they took third.
Franklin & Marshall has captured the last two tournament titles, and will look to become the first in CC history to accomplish a three-peat.
The CC championship gets underway at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, with Saturday's and Sunday's rounds teeing off that the same time.