CARLSBAD, Calif. – BYU is used to kicking off national championships.
Because of religious reasons that prohibit the Cougars from competing on Sundays, BYU has played its third round on Thursday afternoon after the practice round in each of its past five NCAA Division I Men’s Golf Championship appearances, including this week at Omni La Costa.
The Cougars are also accustomed to slow starts. BYU made its first trip to nationals in over a decade in 2018 at Karsten Creek, where the Cougars started with a flurry of birdies and even an albatross off the club of Peter Kuest. But a two-hour thunderstorm delay washed away their momentum, and BYU would eventually shoot 24 over en route to a T-24 finish. The next year BYU finished last, 46 shots out of match play, followed by a T-21 finish in 2022 and a T-23 in 2023, where the Cougars fired the worst third-round score and didn’t even stick around for Sunday.
“We’ve butchered that round in the past,” BYU director of golf Todd Miller said. “We just didn’t want to blow ourselves out of the water this year.”
Mission accomplished. BYU posted 1 over on Thursday afternoon at La Costa, a score that should play well come Sunday, especially considering only one team broke par for 72 holes last year.
“It’s by far the best we’ve done on this Thursday round,” said senior Cole Ponich, who was one of two BYU players to shoot even par, one shot worse than Zac Jones’ 1-under 71, which led the team. “It’s a tough round to play well if you don’t have that overwhelming self-belief. It’s just a different atmosphere being out there solo, not seeing other shots affected by wind, not seeing other putts.”
Added Miller: “This is the first time I saw them play their normal golf on this Thursday. For me as a coach, this feels like a victory.”
Miller calls this year’s squad the most mentally tough team he’s been around. Ponich describes it as the hardest-working bunch in program history. The sixth-year senior is a big reason why.
Ponich was a two-time AJGA All-American, a contemporary with the likes of John Pak, Ryan Gerard an Joe Highsmith, a recent PGA Tour winner whom Ponich traveled with frequently in junior golf. Ponich’s issue when he arrived in Provo was his small frame, weighing in at just 120 pounds.
“I was small, and I put everything I had in my body into my golf swing to be able to keep up with these guys,” Ponich said.
By his junior year, Ponich had developed a back injury that crept into his left rib cage. Every shot was painful, and eventually Ponich shut it down for six months, only chipping and putting. He didn’t play competitively for over a year, losing his power and his feel, the latter of which was especially debilitating for a competitor who prided himself on one of the best short games in amateur golf.
“He just never felt good day in and day out,” Miller said. “That injury pulled him away from being able to practice. For him, that was really hard to see his game go down because he couldn’t practice and he didn’t feel the strength he normally felt.”
Added Ponich: “At one point there it was looking like I might not be able to compete with these guys anymore, and I kind of lost some of the passion and drive. But I randomly just said, hey, I’m tired of not being where I used to be.”
The 24-year-old Ponich’s resurgence started last summer, when he rededicated himself to practicing, including six to eight hours every day of chipping and putting, and working out. He gained about 30 pounds of muscle, and he capped his summer by winning the Utah State Amateur.
“That sparked the old confidence I had in myself and kind of brought back a new life,” Ponich said. “Ever since then, I’ve just slowly worked my way into being confident again and believing in myself.”
Ranked No. 77 in the country entering nationals, Ponich posted four top-5s this season, including a runner-up showing at the NCAA Reno Regional, which BYU won as a team. He’s had an impact on the Cougars with more than his score, too.
“He’s like a Ryder Cup captain within the team,” Miller said. “He says the right things, he builds the guys up, so as a coach it’s been really fun to see him finish this way.”
BYU, which at No. 19 in the nation earned the final spot in the top wave at La Costa, followed Thursday’s round with a first-round, 1-over 289, which has them inside the current match-play cut line at T-8 with Colorado.
It’s unfamiliar territory for the Cougars, but one they’re certainly pleased to be in.
Arguably no one is happier than Ponich.
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