North Greenville golfers heat up in cold weather, take first place
Posted by The Skyliner on April 15th, 2009Cory Guinn
Staff Writer
With wind gusts of up to 30 miles per hour and low temperatures outside, the Crusader golf team played in North Greenville’s annual BMW Intercollegiate golf tournament on April 6-7 at Cherokee Valley Country Club in Tigerville.
On day one NGU golfers Brandon Coggins, junior elementary education, and Brad Caldwell, junior sports management, both shot an impressive 73 in the tough conditions. Other Scores for NGU were Harrison Martin, sophomore undecided, who shot a 76, Richard Smith, junior undecided, who shot a 79 and Andrew Beck, sophomore undecided, who shot an 81. All of these players helped lead NGU to a tie of first-place at the end of the first round of the tournament.
“I am very pround of the way my team performed despite the extreme conditions,” head coach Jeff Patillo said.
North Greenville faced cold weather once again on day two of the tournament but the weather was unable to stop the Crusaders from getting hot.
The NGU golf team was able to finish the tournament in first place while every player on the team shot under 80 for the day. Beck and Caldwell led the Crusaders in the final round each posting a 74 while Coggins shot a 75 and Martin and Smith both shot 79.
North Greenville finished eight strokes ahead of second place Limestone College and Spartanburg Methodist College came in third, 29 behind the Crusaders. Caldwell was a tournament medalist and an All Tournament performer and Coggins was also an All Tournament performer honoree.
“I think course knowledge helped us tremendously,” Coggins said of the team’s reason for winning. “When the weather is bad, you just have to maintain your focus and grind it out on every shot. In the wind, there is no doubt that bad shots are going to come, you just have to keep grinding and play it shot by shot.”
The Crusader’s final tournament of the 2009 season will be April 13-14 in Etowah, N.C., at the Independent Intercollegiate Invitational.