Sept. 24, 2003
Men's Golf Wins the Central Regional Fall Invitational
The Truman men's golf team had all five golfers finish within two strokes of each other as it won the tournament title this week at the Central Regional Fall Invitational, which was held at the Wildflower Golf Course in Detroit Lakes, Minn. It is the first tournament championship for the team since they won the Truman Invitational during the 1995-96 season.
The Bulldogs led the tournament after the first day of action on Monday with a team score of 301. Truman cut five strokes off that score on Tuesday for a two-day total of 597, which tied the team with Missouri Western, who shot the second day's best team round of 287. The Bulldogs won the tiebreaker over the Griffons, which was who had the better score that was thrown out each day (for team scoring, the top four scores count while the fifth is not used). Both teams did not use rounds of 76 on the second day, but the Bulldogs' high score of 77 on Monday was better than the Griffons' high score of 84.
All five Bulldogs finished in the top 16 out of the 58 golfers at the tournament. Junior Jason Bertram (Manchester, Mo./Parkway South) led the team for the second straight tournament with rounds of 76 and 73. His final score of 149 tied him for eighth overall. Three Bulldogs were among six players who finished tied for tenth with scores of 150. Freshman Jesse Helms (Hillsboro, Mo./Hillsboro) had rounds of 74 and 76, junior Austin George (Wichita, Kan./Andover) had rounds of 76 and 74 and senior Jake Mann (Monmouth, Ill./Monmouth) shot scores of 77 and 73. Rounding out the squad was senior Brett Meeske (Moline, Ill./Moline) who had a 75-76=151, which tied him for 16th place.
The men's golf team will be in action again on Oct. 6-7 at the Missouri Southern Tournament, the final MIAA scoring meet of the fall season.