Loyola Marymount’s men’s golf team got the new season off on the right foot.
The Lions came from two strokes behind in the final round to defeat Washington State by one shot and capture the True Blue-Golfweek Fall Challenge at True Blue Golf Club on Pawleys Island, S.C.
“The greens were soft, the ball was going far, there wasn’t a lot of wind,” Coach Jason D’Amore said, who was on his cell phone with assistant coach Michael McCabe while trying to determine where the Lions were down the stretch. “It was just kind of one of those perfect recipes where you got some guys who could play some good golf and the golf course really just didn’t have a ton of defense because of the conditions.
“Once we got to 16, 17, 18, it was a lot of playing telephone and trying to figure out where we were. … If we didn’t play great this week, we’d be hoping we had awhile but since we played well, so it will be nice to get going again.
“One of the guys said something about, this makes the 5:30 a.m. wakeup calls for workouts worth it. My response was it does, but it also makes you excited for the next 5:30 a.m. workout because you know that those days are what leads to winning a championship and having a chance to win.”
Loyola Marymount won for the first time since The Joust at Goose Creek followed by the Sacramento State Invitational on back-to-back weeks in 2021, and the Lions will be right back at it in the USF/Howard Intercollegiate beginning on Monday at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco.
The Lions finished with a score of 271-274-272—817, 47-under-par, while Washington State was second at 272-271-275—818, followed by Western Carolina at 279-266-277—822, Arkansas State at 274-274-280—828 and Wright State at 287-277-276—840.
Coastal Carolina totaled 281-273-287—841 to tie for sixth with Jacksonville University, which finished at 282-285-274—841, while Jacksonville State wound up at 282-280-285—847 to tie for eighth with Richmond, which shot 279-279-289—847, and Charleston Southern, which came in at 287-282-278—847.
Pono Yanagi of Washington posted a score 66-66-67—199, 17-under-par, and tied for the individual title with Thomas Schmidt of Arkansas State, who shot 66-64-69—199, while Riley Lewis led Loyola Marymount with a score of 65-68-68—203 to tie for third with Magnus Pedersen of Western Carolina, who wound up at 66-67-68—201.
Pablo Hernandez of Western Carolina was fifth at 68-65-70—203, followed by Sam Renner of Washington State, who finished at 68-67-69—204, while Tony Hendricks of Loyola Marymount shot 69-68-68—205 to finish in a tie for seventh that included his Lions teammate Mason Snyder, who totaled 68-66-71—205, and Ivan Ninkovich of Western Carolina, who wound up at 72-66-67—205.
Alexandre Vandermoten of Jacksonville University carded a score of 69-70-67—206 to tie for 10th with Ludvig Erikson of Coastal Carolina, who finished at 69-69-68—206, and Chris Somerfield of Arkansas State, who came in at 68-68-70—206.
Rounding out the scoring for team champion Loyola Marymount were Caden McMackin in a tie for 25th at 68-72-71—211, Trevor Algya in a tie for 38th at 69-72-72—213 and Cade Anderson in a tie for 43rd at 71-78-65—214.
For complete results, visit: https://results.golfstat.com//public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=28134
