Historic Season Comes Home To ECC On Monday and Tuesday
by Rob Moseley
Editor, GoDucks.com
The Oregon men's golf team is entering the stretch run of one of the best seasons in school history, and will kick it off this week at home.
The No. 8 UO men will play in the 26th annual Duck Invitational on Monday and Tuesday at Eugene Country Club. Head coach Casey Martin's team has won five events in 2014-15, tied for second-most in school history, and has been led by freshman Aaron Wise, who became the sixth UO player to win two events in the same season.
Wise will play in the Duck Invitational's featured pairing, with two top-five players in the World Amateur Golf Rankings. He'll be joined by No. 2 Jon Rahm of Arizona State and No. 5 Cheng-Tsung Pan of Washington for Monday's 36 holes, set for a shotgun start at 8:30 a.m.
Wise was medalist at the Ka'anapali Classic during the Ducks' four-wins-in-four-tournaments fall season. He was the top individual again in Oregon's most recent event, the Desert Mountain Intercollegiate, which the Ducks won to rebound from a rocky start to the spring season.
"He's a special player, for sure," Martin said. "He's motivated to keep doing that. He's going to be thrown to the wolves, playing with Rahm and Pan. But I think he'll look forward to that. That doesn't scare him."
Rahm and Pan are two of 11 top-100 players on hand for the Duck Invitational. The 15-team field also includes the likes of San Diego State, San Diego and Oregon State. After two rounds Monday, teams will play a final 18-hole round Tuesday, also beginning at 8:30 a.m.
Fans are welcome to attend the tournament, and may need to prepare for rainy conditions. After an unseasonably dry Eugene winter, forecasts call for moisture.
"We have had no experience this winter dealing with rain, which is hard to even fathom saying," Martin said. "But we need to get used to it. We were hitting balls this week with gloves and water. The vets have been through it, but a couple of the young guys haven't seen the rain."
That said, the Ducks should feel right at home at Eugene Country Club, where they finished second in last season's NCAA West Regional before advancing to the national championship tournament. The course — which will host the 2016 NCAA Championships — will play at 7,020 yards for the Duck Invitational, with par at 72.
Martin said the Ducks are a bit "rusty" after not playing for a couple of weeks, and focusing on final exams this past week. Practice time during finals week was voluntary, until the UO men were able to turn their attention to tournament preparation late in the week.
"This golf course, we play it a lot," Martin said. "We're used to it. But there's some intimidating shots out there that other teams will have to reckon with. We deal with it every day, and should have an advantage that way, if we can just keep our wits about us."
Oregon's mental edge was tested earlier this spring after the Ducks' amazing fall. The team entered spring play ranked No. 2 in the country, and the pressure of playing up to that ranking may have factored into Oregon's inconsistent February.
The Ducks started the spring with a third-place finish in the Amer Ari Invitational, struggled to 13th in The Prestige at PGA WEST and then, in their third event in less than three weeks, took fifth in the Cowboy Desert Intercollegiate.
"When you're a marked team and things don't go well, you feel that extra pressure," Martin said. "That's a challenge in golf. What people think, and expectations, are a big deal. We're trying to get back to doing what we do: Play golf, and do it the best you can. Focus on the process, and not what the scoreboard says all the time."
