Low scores were had on a sunny Friday in the first round of the U.S. Intercollegiate tournament at Stanford, but it proved to be the calm before the storm. Literally.
The next two days saw a mix of showers and winds that caused trouble for the No. 4 UCLA men’s golf team and the rest of the field in Palo Alto.
“(Friday) there was almost no wind,” said junior Pontus Widegren, whose score of 211 ( 1) helped the Bruins to a fourth-place finish. “So that was the day that you were trying to fire at most of the pins and try to stack up on birdies going into Saturday and Sunday because we knew the weather was going to get worse.”
At one point on Saturday the weather had taken such a downturn that officials were forced to delay the round for an hour and a half, calling golfers in from the course while they waited for the weather to improve.
The delay was a welcome break for Widegren, who used it to regain his concentration and composure in the midst of a stretch where he shot over par on back-to-back holes.
“For some the delay was a bit of a relief, a kind of pause from all the turbulence going on with the crazy weather. It was pretty good for me to get that break and mentally regroup,” Widegren said.
Despite the poor conditions, UCLA was able to finish with four golfers in the top 10 on the individual leaderboard.
Unfortunately for the Bruins, though, two of those golfers’ scores, sophomore Anton Arboleda’s and freshman Jay Hwang’s, didn’t count towards the team’s final result.
Arboleda and Hwang were entered into the tournament as individual participants rather than in the team lineup.
Although the rough weather presented certain problems, it also had its benefits.
The wet course rewarded golfers who had accurate drives with welcoming greens on approach shots, which contributed to junior Pedro Figueiredo’s score of 209 (-1).
“My short game helped me a lot this week and I wasn’t out of position off of the tee,” said Figueiredo, who finished tied for second place on the individual leaderboard. “The greens weren’t too firm because of the rain, so it was fairly easy to chip the ball close to the hole.”
Figueiredo and the Bruins were not content with the team’s fourth-place finish, competing until the final hole to improve their result even if a victory wasn’t in the cards.
“The higher you finish, the better, and of course we want to finish at the top spot every tournament,” Figueiredo said. “We never give up even if we’re not close to the lead. That’s how we have to approach our game even if it’s not going that well.”