The Mustangs finished second at the Conference USA Men’s Golf Championships, which wrapped up Tuesday at the University of Central Florida’s RedTail Golf Club near Orlando.
No. 24 UCF shot 18-under par and won the three-round event with a total score of 846, just six strokes better than SMU (852). The Knights, who led the event from start to finish, earned an automatic bid to the NCAA Regionals.
The Mustangs were in second place after each of the first two rounds as well, shooting the low score Monday at 285.
The University of Alabama-Birmingham finished third with a final tally of 861.
Junior Draegen Majors led SMU with a score of 210 (six under par), good for fourth place on the individual leader board. Majors was also one of five golfers named to the All-Tournament Team.
Sophomore Kelly Kraft tied the University of Houston’s Brady Shivers for sixth (212).
UCF junior Simon Ward shot below par in each round (69-68-68) and led the field with an individual score of 205 en route to being named MVP. Teammate Blayne Barber, who also never shot at or above par (68-69-69), finished one stroke off of Ward’s lead with a 206.
The Mustangs’ second-place finish was its highest of the season, though they came close multiple times.
The team finished in third place at both the Jerry Pate Invite in Birmingham and the Louisiana Classics in Lafayette, La. SMU placed fourth in its regular-season finale last week, the Mizzou Tiger Intercollegiate in Columbia, Mo.
SMU captured three consecutive conference titles (2004-05: Western Athletic Conference, 2006: Conference USA) before placing fourth at the conference championships the last two years, though the team was still selected to advance to the NCAA Regionals in 2007 and 2008.
SMU concluded its 2008-2009 schedule with nine top 10 finishes, one shy of last year’s total of 10.
Individually, Kraft, last season’s conference Freshman of the Year, was named conference Golfer of the Week three times to bring his career total to five.
In addition, freshmen James Kwon and Marc Sambol each picked up their first career C-USA Golfer of the Week honors this year.
