Men’s Golf: Outplayed and Outpaced in the Sahalee Players Championship

The ‘Cats flew out west chasing birdies and leaderboard glory. What they found instead was Sahalee’s unforgiving competition, a bogey-heavy weekend and a final showing that landed them in the bunker.

The Sahalee Players Championship, hosted by the University of Washington, spanned two days and started with 36 holes of continuous play on Saturday and concluded with 18 holes on Sunday. A total of 11 other programs hit the green, including host-school Washington alongside Arizona, Arizona State, Oregon, Pepperdine, UCLA, Texas, North Carolina, Florida and players from the US National Development Program. In the end, 10 of them topped the Wildcats, leaving them in second-to-last.

As far as players go, the Evergreen State welcomed five ‘Cats to compete as a team. This roster, a mix of experience and novelty, included senior Daniel Svärd, junior Jeremy Chen, redshirt sophomore Rowan Sullivan and first-year students Monty Holcombe and Issac Lee. Also competing independently was junior Archie Finnie.

Round one saw all teams gaining their bearings on the green. Only Texas was able to card a 72 to shoot on par. Finishing ahead of Oregon, Florida and San Diego State, Northwestern tied Arizona for 8th after shooting a mid-range 14-over. The rest of the teams saw anywhere from 6-over to 23-over finishes. Sullivan piloted the ‘Cats this round and finished on par with a card of 72. In this performance, he led the Northwestern squad with five birdies.

Later on Saturday evening, the ‘Cats aimed to improve their strokes and climb a couple of leaderboard spots. Unfortunately, only one of these items came true. Even though Northwestern shot 10-over — four strokes better than its earlier performance — it posted the worst score overall and landed four strokes behind the next best team, North Carolina. A brutal 19 bogeys from this round did not help the outcome.

Still, it wasn’t all bad. Svärd shot 3-under, posting the team’s only under-par card of the weekend, and even snagged an eagle on the fourth hole — one of 17 players to record this statistic for the tournament.

The final round on Sunday did not see any improvement from the ‘Cats, and this time they shot the second-worst with 21-over par. Sullivan and Holcombe did the best this round with cards of 75 and 76, respectively, but it was simply not enough to kick Northwestern up on the leaderboard. Finishing the weekend, the ‘Cats fell to 11th place after accumulating a total of 45-over during the three rounds. The only team behind them was Oregon, which carded a 51-over.

Much of this outcome stems from two major problems: among all 12 teams, the ‘Cats collected the most bogeys, finishing with a total of 73. They also matched Oregon for the most doubles+, accumulating a total of 19 on the weekend.

The course proved itself moderately difficult. 14 of the 18 holes were played over par, and the overall average score was a 75.29. The 444-yard 8th hole had the highest average score (4.63), with the subsequent 9th hole garnering the next highest average of 3.44. Only the par-5s had an average that was under par, with the lowest being hole six (4.78 average).

Adding salt to the wound, out of the leaderboards for best averages in par-3, Northwestern came last (3.43 average). For par-4 and par-5 holes, it was not much better, coming in second-to-last (with averages of 4.37 and 4.92, respectively).

Overall, Sullivan led Northwestern with his impressive finishes, climbing to 29th in the player leaderboard with carded rounds of 72, 76, and 75 and a finish of 7-over once Sunday had concluded. 11 birdies across his three rounds earned him a share of 10th in a six-way tie. He also squeezed into a five-way tie for best average on par-5s with a 4.50.

Beyond Sullivan’s standout debut for the ‘Cats, the leaderboard was not giving anyone their personal bests. Holcombe settled at 50th, Svärd and Chen tied at 55th, Finnie hit 64th and Lee brought up the rear at 69th.

Next up, the ‘Cats travel slightly north for the prestigious Jackson T. Stephens Cup. Taking place September 15-17 in Lake Bluff, Illinois, Northwestern will join Texas, the University of Arizona, Louisiana State University, the University of North Carolina, Southern Methodist University and a handful of invited players from Historically Black Colleges and Universities and United States Service Academies. The premiere event will feature a combination of match play and stroke play with an official practice round on September 14.