After contending throughout the entire tournament, Mizzou men’s golf walked away with a second-place finish from the Bank of Tennessee Intercollegiate Oct. 14-16 in Jonesborough, Tennessee.
The Tigers, ranked No. 24 in the Golfstat rankings, hung tight with No. 17 Virginia, which won the tournament with a team score of -32. Trailing by 10 shots entering Sunday’s final round, coach Mark Leroux’s Tigers put a solid effort on to keep pressure on Virginia, finishing at -22 as a team.
Led by the strong play of Linus Lilliedahl, who finished tied for sixth individually at -9, the Tigers got within eight strokes of Virginia. The Tigers finished runners-up for the second time in as many tournaments after winning their season opener. Lilliedahl, a Sweden native, has seemed poised for a career season in his senior year after his career-best fourth place finish at last month’s Jackrabbit Invitational.
The solid team performance was aided by strong individual outings in addition to Lilliedahl’s. Euan Walker has emerged as the team’s strongest performer so far, showcasing his talent throughout the opening tournaments. The Scotsman continued the impressive start to his season, recording third, second and now 13th-place performances in each tournament this season, respectively.
Not far behind Lilliedahl and Walker was Matt Echelmeier, who finished his second tournament of the season tied for 20th at -3 overall for the tournament. After contending for the individual lead early on after recording two rounds of 69, the Columbia native and Rock Bridge High School graduate closed with a final-round 75.
Hayden Buckley, making his season debut for the Tigers, finished tied for 28th at even par for the tournament. After missing the first two tournaments due to injury to start the season, the Belfort, Mississippi, native started out strong with an opening-round 71, followed by 72 and 73.
Buckley was followed by Trevor Ullestad. The Indian Hills Junior College transfer struggled through an opening-round 79. Despite recording even par rounds of 72 in both the second and third rounds, he could not recover and return to contention.
The Tigers will be back in action in two weeks, when they travel to the Aloha State to compete in the Warrior Princeville Makai Invitational from Oct. 30 to Nov. 1 in Kauai, Hawai’i. It will be the first time in program history that the Tigers have competed in the tournament.
_Edited by Peter Baugh | pbaugh@themaneater.com_
