by David J. Chavez
Daily Lobo
The University of New Mexico men's golf team is taking on a tough course and tough competition this weekend.
The Lobos' lineup for this weekend's William H. Tucker Intercollegiate tournament at the UNM Championship Golf Course includes Mark Anderson, Jay Choi, Charlie Beljan, Robb Bierbaum and Nick Geyer.
Anderson said the University Championship Golf Course is one of the toughest collegiate courses in the Mountain West Conference. The grass on the course is short and firm, which makes the ball move fast from the spot it landed in, Anderson said.
"This course is one of the more challenging courses we will play on all season," he said. "It gives us a huge advantage to play on a course we're so familiar with, but it's not that easy."
Team members said having home course advantage will increase their chances for the title this weekend. Head coach Glen Millican likes the course's difficulty level and agrees with his team's evaluation of the advantages that it brings.
"The conditions on this course are not seen a lot in college golf, with fast greens and the high rough," he said. "The harder the course is, the bigger advantage we have over the rest of the teams."
Arizona won the tournament last year with New Mexico finishing in second place. Arizona is coming back to defend their title, and a host of top teams from around the country are looking to stop them. This weekend's field includes four teams ranked in the top 20. Golfweek ranks the Lobos fifth, Arizona at No. 25, University of Nevada-Las Vegas at No. 4 and Brigham Young at No. 12.
The top four players from each team get their score counted at the end of the tournament.
"I get really involved in the team aspect of college golf. It's the best time I've had playing golf," Anderson said. "Winning is fun, but winning with my friends and a coach I look up to and respect, who's a good friend and a good leader, makes it 10 times better."
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The teams will be playing 36 holes the first day and 18 the second day. Choi, one of UNM's top players, has played the course many times throughout his college career.
"The first day is really important because we play 36 holes. It's good to position ourselves at the top for the second day," he said. "There's going to be a lot of tough competition this weekend, but I think we'll come out on top."
Millican said he would like the whole team to perform well, but in the end all that matters are those top four.
"I'd like to see all of our guys play well, but we only need four to win the tournament," he said. "It's our home tournament, so we want to have as good of a showing as we can. We always want to play well, but obviously there's more of an emphasis on your home tournament, because we have an advantage, since we play here all the time."
