Gators Ready for SEC Championship
Wednesday, April 15, 2015 | Men's Golf
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Coming off of its best score of the year, the University of Florida men's golf team looks to continue its success when it enters postseason play at the SEC Championship this weekend. The quest for the conference title begins Friday morning, when the teams tee off at the three-day tournament at the Sea Island Golf Club Seaside Course in St. Simons Island, Ga.
In its most recent showing at the Old Waverly Collegiate Championship, Florida posted its season-best tournament score en route to collecting UF's fourth runner-up finish of the year.
J.D. Tomlinson has been the Gators' best finisher in the last five tournaments and holds the team's lowest stroke average, 71.70. He'll lead Florida's lineup, followed by A.J. Crouch, who owns the team's only individual title of the season.
Alejandro Tosti and Ryan Orr, who earned top-20 finishes at the most recent tournament, will play in the No. 3 and No. 4 spots. Eric Banks, who is coming off a career-best performance at Old Waverly, will play in the No. 5 position.
The Gators look to improve on last year's performance at the conference championship, where they finished tied for 12th. Banks was Florida's top finisher at the event, tying for 26th.
Head Coach JC Deacon
On competing at the Seaside Course:
“The golf course is supposedly unbelievable. I've never been there before but heard rave reviews about it. Most of our team has played there, so we have some experience, and everyone is raring to go. I know the seniors, Eric Banks and J.D. Tomlinson, are really ready to get after it, and I'm really excited to see what we can do.”
On the team's progress throughout the season:
“We're working three times as hard as we did when we started this year, so that's all I can ask for as a coach. The attitude is so much better than it was when we started, and that's obviously another huge thing, so, right there, we're so far ahead of where we were when we started the year. I looked back to that first tournament we had. It was a heavy SEC field, and we were 12 shots behind the second-to-last place team after the first day. To think about how far this team has come since that day, it makes me so proud.”
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Course Information: The Sea Island Golf Club Seaside Course is a par-70, 7,055-yard course.
Tournament Information: The tournament will run Friday-Sunday, April 17-19, and is hosted by the Southeastern Conference.
Format: Three-day, 54-hole tournament, with 18 holes played each day. Tee times begin at 7:30 a.m. each day.
TV Coverage: A recap show of the SEC Championship will airWednesday, April 29, at 10 p.m. on the SEC Network.
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Florida History at the SEC Championship:
- Florida has won the SEC Championship 15 times, most recently in 2011.
- A Gator has won the individual title at the SEC Championship 21 times.
- The last Gator to take the crown was Andres Echavarria, who won in 2011 with a score of 848.
The Gators' Lineup:
J.D. Tomlinson (Gainesville, Fla.)
A.J. Crouch (Jacksonville, Fla.)
Alejandro Tosti (Rosario, Argentina)
Ryan Orr (Belleair, Fla.)
Eric Banks (Truro, Canada)
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Eyeing the Competition: The field consists of the 14 teams from the Southeastern Conference. Five of the squads are ranked in Golfweek's Top 25, with four of those teams holding top-10 spots.
Tournament Field (Golfweek's Top 25):
Alabama (21)
Arkansas
Auburn (6)
FLORIDA
Georgia
Kentucky
LSU (9)
Ole Miss
Mississippi State
Missouri
South Carolina (8)
Tennessee
Texas A&M
Vanderbilt (4)
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Follow the Gators: Live scoring will be available on GolfStat.com and SECsports.com. A complete recap with full results will be posted on GatorZone.com following the day's play.
For complete coverage of the Gators' men's golf program, visit GatorZone.com, follow @GatorZoneGolf on Twitter and 'like' the University of Florida Men's Golf page on Facebook.
