Men’s golf to compete in team match play event

It’s not March, but this could be a weekend of madness for the UCLA men’s golf team.

The Bruins travel to Greensboro, Ga. this weekend for the Callaway Collegiate Match Play Championships, a 16-team match play tournament on the Oconee Course at Reynolds Plantation. UCLA drew the No. 4 seed and will face the No. 13 seed, Minnesota, in the first round Sunday.

This is the only team match play event the Bruins play this year, and the bracket format will surely deliver plenty of surprises.

“(The format) makes it more exciting just like in college basketball,” junior Erik Flores said.

The team match play format is very different from the stroke play events typical to college golf. Unlike most tournaments, there is no individual competition. Instead, five Bruins will take on five players from the opposing team in head-to-head matchups. The team that wins the majority of the matches advances to the next round.

“I love the head-to-head match format, I think it’s great,” coach Derek Freeman said. “It makes camaraderie more important. Guys are really pushing each other and wanting each other to play well. It’s a complete team.”

The match play format has become so popular among coaches and players that the NCAA is thinking about using it in its national championship as early as 2009.

Players love the team match play format because it eliminates the sense of individual competition, and puts the focus solely on team performance.

“There’s a sense of camaraderie all year round, but it’s definitely amplified when it’s purely a team competition,” Flores said. “When it’s a one-on-one matchup with another team, that changes the atmosphere big time.”

The Bruins are also excited for this weekend because it will provide an opportunity for them to face the top teams in the nation. UCLA will bring six players: Flores, Kevin Chappell, Craig Leslie, James Lee, Philip Francis and Jason Kang, although only five players compete in each round.

UCLA was ranked No. 2 in the Golfweek preseason poll, but because the team has played in only one tournament since the start of the season, they are currently unranked. That could change this weekend though, as the top five teams in the Golfweek poll will all be competing: No. 1 Charlotte, No. 2 Alabama, No. 3 Georgia Tech, No. 4 Georgia and No. 5 Oklahoma State.

“It’s going to be a big tournament for us statement-wise,” Flores said. “We haven’t played nearly as much as the other top teams, so we’re kind of an unknown. And when you’re an unknown, people don’t like it.”

The Oconee Course is just 5 years old, but it’s already gaining the reputation of being one of the finest in the country. This year it hosted the PGA Cup, and in 2008 it will host the PGA National championships.

At 7029 yards, the course is a great setup for a match play event. The 546-yard, par-5 17th hole will give players a chance to play aggressively late in the match.

And if any of the matches reach the 18th hole, there will certainly be a dramatic conclusion. Players will have to drive over a lake on their final tee shot, and avoid the water that lines the left side of the finishing hole.

“You want those things in a match play event,” Freeman said. “You want to have difficult deciding holes at the end; a lot of big swings are going to take place on those last holes.”

If the course and format weren’t enough, there could be another twist to the competition this week for UCLA. The Bruins could potentially meet Duke, a team led by former UCLA coach O.D. Vincent, in the semifinal round.

“That would be pretty fun,” Flores said. “But it’s not like there’s any bad blood.”

CLUB HOPPING: Many of the Bruins brought their 2-irons to their first tournament of the year, last week’s Big Ten/Pac-10 Challenge, instead of using a hybrid club.

This week most of the players will go back to the hybrids, because the conditions won’t be as windy in Georgia as they were last week in University Place, Wash.

Irons are preferable in windy conditions because they keep the ball lower to the ground, where it is less affected by winds. When the wind is negligible, however, players choose hybrids because they make it easier to hit and stop on the green.

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