Golf finishes second in Westminster Invitational
Last Monday Carnegie Mellon, along with 10 other teams, participated in the Westminster Invitational at the New Castle Country Club.
The Tartans had a strong outing, finishing in second place overall with a carded score of 307. The Tartans finished three strokes behind Division II rival Clarion University which shot a combined 304 for the day.
“We were going in hoping to win,” junior Alex Timmons said. “We didn’t lose anything by losing to Clarion because they are Division II, but it’s always a bonus to beat a Division II team.”
Carnegie Mellon’s team of five representatives set the bar high as they would all finish the day within the top 20 golfers. Among them was Timmons, who led the competition by shooting a 70, two under par. Timmons received individual medal honors as he scored under par for his third straight match.
“On the front nine I was kind of struggling.” Timmons said. “I was just keeping it together. Then on the back nine some things just clicked and I started playing better.”
Timmons was paired with Nick Sanner of Clarion University who placed one stroke behind Timmons with a score of 71.
“On 18 I made about a 14-foot putt for par to beat him and I knew at that point that I would probably win,” Timmons said.
Other notable scores included junior Joshua Chen who completed his first top-10 finish shooting a 77 on the day which tied him for fifth place. Sophomore Chris Lee ended the day finishing 12th with a score of 79. Howard Smith ended his day in 14th place with a final score of 81. Lastly, Blake Darby came in at 17th place with 82 strokes.
“We hoped to win but we didn’t shoot ourselves in the foot for coming in second place,” Timmons said.
The Tartans also had four players participate in the individual division. Senior Denver Faulk scored an 82 which put him in 17th place on the day. Sophomore Adam Klein concluded his day with an 83 while first-year Brent Driscoll wrapped up with an 85. Finally, sophomore Nick Burkholder carded a 94, putting him in 50th place.
Next, the Tartans will be participating in the ECAC Southwest Championships. The event begins Sunday, Oct. 14 and will conclude Monday, Oct. 15 at the Wildwood Golf Club.
“We are going to go in with the same motivation to win,” Timmons said. “We need all of our players, one through five, to shoot in the 70s to achieve anything good.”