One coast and one week apart, the Cordevalle Tournament, hosted
by the UCLA men’s golf team this past Monday and Tuesday, was
a big change from their match last week in Florida where Hurricane
Wilma halted play for an entire day.
Not only were there clear skies, but when the two-day Cordevalle
event came to an end, a first-place finish out of 16 teams was a
welcome change for the Bruins, who finished in 11th place last
week.
While Northwestern led by two strokes after 36 holes on Monday,
UCLA came through with a solid 18-hole performance the next day to
win the tournament by a margin of six strokes.
All five of the Bruin participants contributed to the win, each
placing in the top 25 out of more than 80 players.
“It was the first time that we’ve ever hosted the
tournament,” said coach O.D. Vincent.
“We did have our team retreat at the Cordevalle course
earlier this season. There is no question that the retreat helped
our win, because it was nice to have the course be a little more
familiar.”
The team’s top finisher, freshman Erik Flores, placed
second overall with a score of 4-under par.
Not far behind were his teammates freshman James Lee and
sophomore Daniel Im, tied for fourth place.
Also representing UCLA was junior Chris Heintz, who scored
1-over par, and just one stroke away from him was freshman Lucas
Lee.
Junior Peter Campbell said the team was excited about the
Cordevalle Tournament because of the immense booster support.
“All of the players at the tournament performed extremely
well, as shown by our win,” said Vincent.
Just a week before Cordevalle, five members of the team arrived
in Florida amid rumors that a hurricane might hit on day two of
their three-day tournament.
“The officials were good about taking all the precautions
necessary,” said Vincent.
The match was ultimately changed so the teams could all take off
a day while the hurricane swept through Orlando.
“On Monday, it was blowing a gale out there and none of us
had ever been in a hurricane before,” said Campbell.
“We weren’t in any danger, but we were staying at the
Disney World Resort, and they closed all the rides down at Disney
World when the hurricane came.”
A week later at the hurricane-free tournament in San Martin, six
of the teams that competed were from the Pac-10 conference,
including UCLA, Cal, Stanford, Arizona, USC and Washington.
All five of the UCLA men fared better than defending NCAA
champion James Lepp from the University of Washington, who also
participated in the tournament.
“Since we were in charge of the tournament, we decided to
invite a lot of our conference schools, including Washington, where
I used to coach and play,” said Vincent.
“Washington was also a great candidate because of the fact
that they have a top-10 program.”
The tournament was greatly supported by UCLA alumnus and former
Bruin baseball player Jack Gifford.
Next week’s tournament in nearby Simi Valley will be
attended by five members of the UCLA team.