A rocky return for Cougar men’s golf 

Cougs place 15th at John Burns Intercollegiate

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COURTESY OF WASHINGTON STATE ATHLETICS

The men’s golf team played its last round of the season on Wednesday at the Pac-12 championship.

ERICK AGUILAR, Evergreen reporter

The men’s team competed in Hawai’i from Feb. 16–18 at the John Burns Intercollegiate. The men’s team is still figuring out where they fit with the rest of the PAC-12, but this season has been a strong showing for the Cougars thus far.

The 46th Annual John Burns Intercollegiate Invitational is hosted at the Hokuala Golf Club’s Ocean Course in Lihue, Hawai’i.

The starting five for your Cougars featured Pono Yanagi, Preston Bebich, Jaden Cantafio, Peter Jung and Sam Renner.

Fellow PAC-12 competitors Arizona, California, Utah and USC were present for the tournament, all placing over the Cougars.

Cal golfer Sampson Zheng tied for first place along with Sam Bennett, the golfer from Texas A&M. Both shot a remarkable score of 198, ending every round under par.

Bebich and Renner led the team, both shooting 215 and tying for 58th place in the individual standings.

Jung, the sophomore from Honolulu was not far from home last week and he was even closer to the team leaders with a score of 216.

Cantafio shot a 217 and Yanagi, another Hawaii native brought up the rear, as he shot a 220.

The team shot a collective score of 856 locking them into a 15th-place tie with the team from University of Las Vegas Nevada.

The team will get another break from the Palouse’s brisk cold as they head to La Quinta in Palm Desert, California to try their luck in The Prestige hosted by University of California Davis.

The Prestige will host some of the nation’s top competition including nationally ranked teams No. 2 Auburn, No. 3 Texas Tech and No. 6 Stanford.

From the PAC-12, the Cougars will face Oregon State, No. 23 Colorado State and the pesky No. 29 Washington Huskies.

This will be the first time the Cougs team will meet the rival purple and gold since the season-opening Husky invitational. Just to jog your memory, the Huskies finished third and the Cougars walked away with the first-place gold.

Soon after, look for the team to return to the pacific northwest for University of Idaho-hosted Bandon Dunes Tournament in Bandon, Oregon.