Tiger golf struggles through first leg of the season

The Fort Hays State University men’s golf team has had three competitions already this year, with another coming up on Oct. 13th and 14th in St. Joseph, Missouri at the Missouri Western Invitational.
The first competition was on September 8th and 9th 2014 at the Lincoln Invitational in Camdenton, Missouri. This was also the Tiger’s first Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MIAA) competition for golf.

Eleven of the fourteen MIAA schools were represented. Overall, the Tigers placed ninth in the Lincoln Invitational with a score of 125 strokes over par. Trey Herman, Hays senior, led the team finishing 7 strokes over par. Herman had a slow start in his first round, shooting 80 on a par 71 course. He quickly got it together for the second round, shooting even and then going 2 under par in the third round which tied him for 7th place. For the other Tiger’s, the first competition was not so kind.

“We have a couple of guys on the team with little experience, so it has been struggling at times for these guys. As they get more rounds under their belt though, they will show improvement. Playing is the only way to better your game,” said Herman.

The Tigers participated on September 15th and 16th in their second competition at the University of Nebraska-Kearney Invite. For this Invite, all schools brought five golfers. For each round, the scores were found by taking the top 4 scores, adding them together, and finally adding each rounds totals for the final. This was not a MIAA competition with only 2 MIAA teams in attendance, UNK and FHSU.

The Tiger’s finished with a score of 929 total strokes which placed them in 12th out 14 teams. The Tigers score was ten strokes behind the UNK Lopers and 62 strokes behind first place Minnesota State University. Trey Herman once again led the FHSU Tigers by finishing 2nd overall, with a score of 212 strokes which was 4 strokes under par. His rounds scored as 72, 68, and 72.

“At the UNK Invite, I was a little disappointed in myself. I love Awarii Dunes in Kearney and took second there last year. Going into the UNK Invite this year, I had high expectations. After the first day, I was leading by a couple of shots, but unfortunately, made a few errors that final round and came up short of a victory by a stroke,” said Herman. The other Tigers followed with:

The third competition, the NSU Classic, was held September 22nd and 23rd in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. This was a MIAA competition with 11 of the 14 MIAA schools in attendance. Over two beautiful days for golf, the Tigers managed to take 9th out of the MIAA schools and finished 15th overall. They held the 15th position through all three rounds.

The Tigers finished 98 strokes over par with a score of 950 total strokes. Like usual, Trey Herman led the Tigers, but not as successfully as he had during the previous two competitions by only tying for 32nd with a score of 228 total strokes. This was 15 strokes over par with his rounds scoring as 77, 73, and 78. The number 15 seemed to haunt the Tigers for these two days. The rest of the Tigers finished with:

The next tournament the Tigers will be attending is the Missouri Western Invitational on October 13th and 14th. This will be the last team tournament the Tigers will be participating in this fall. All the Tigers will be trying to polish off their game and get ready for this last tournament.

“After the NSU tournament, I took a few days off since we have a two and a half week break. My performance there wasn’t the best so I gave myself some time to recover. But for this final tournament, I will be focusing on my ball striking and hitting the range quite often,” said Herman.