The men's golf team shot a 295 Tuesday in the final round of the First Tee Collegiate in Little Rock, Ark, giving them a fourth-place finish.
The team's third-round total was the lowest of the 16 teams in the field. The next lowest was a score of 300. Head coach Mike Fleck said he wanted his team to go out in the third round and try to gain some respect from the other schools.
"Today was a really good day," Fleck said. "I challenged the guys this morning to go out and beat the teams we were paired with.
"They went out and took care of their end of it."
The main part of that challenge fell on sophomore Wayne Denger, Fleck said, and he met it by shooting a 70 on Tuesday, which tied the low individual score for the day. He fired rounds of 73 and 75 on Monday to give him a total of 218, which put him in a tie for third place.
"Wayne did a great job today," Fleck said. "Wayne is the one that I really kind of focused that towards because he has a lot of talent."
On Monday, the team had rounds of 296 and 303, which put them in fifth place at that time. Ball State's three-round total of 894 was just one stroke shy of third and six strokes back of first-place Arkansas State.
Junior Patrick Wilkes-Krier also had a strong tournament, with rounds of 73, 77 and 72 that put him in a tie for 10th place.
Fleck said that Wilkes-Krier and Denger have both had two good tournaments in a row now, and he wants them to continue to improve in April.
"I'm hoping that those two can keep doing what they're doing ,and we can bring some other guys along with them," Fleck said.
Sophomore C.D. Hockersmith was the Cardinals' third-best man, shooting rounds of 72, 79 and 77. Senior Lance Scholl and junior Brandon Boomsma rounded out the team's field. Scholl opened the tournament with an 83, but then bettered that, shooting a 75 in round two and a 76 in round three. Boomsma shot a 78, 76 and 82.
The team will know take a week off before returning to action April 8 at the Marshall Invitational.
"I'm excited. I'm hoping we can build on it," Fleck said. "[April] is where we really kind of need to take care of business."
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