With less than two weeks until the Mid-American Conference Championships, this was not the time for the Ball State University men's golf team to play poorly.
After coming off a second place finish at the Marshall Invitational, the Cardinals finished 12th out of 13 teams at the Fossum Taylor Made Invitational.
With a score of 885, the Cardinals finished 44 strokes behind winner Michigan State University. MAC foes Eastern Michigan University and University of Toledo finished 5th and 11th respectively.
"Obviously it is pretty disappointing," coach Mike Fleck said. "We just didn't play very well. We came out with a good first round and were pretty competitive, but in the afternoon we just didn't come out to play. For whatever reason we just couldn't do it. From my perspective it's just disappointing because we got off to a pretty good start but just didn't finish."
Tying for 21st place individually, Andy Skillman led all Cardinals with a score of +1. Wayne Denger, who placed fourth at Marshall, tied for 26th. Although Denger was pleased with his individual performance, he said the team just didn't play well in the stretch.
"We just didn't finish well and we could have done better," Denger said. "We do some great things in practice, but when we play different teams at different courses, we play differently. We were just psyching ourselves out."
Skillman said the team just lost focus in the second and third rounds and was never able to come back.
"It's hard. We just didn't really grind through the hard holes as well as we should have," Skillman said. "We played the easy holes well, but didn't play well through the stretch. The only problem we have is losing our focus. We have the talent; we just have to stay focused on all the holes."
With one more tournament before the MAC Championships, Fleck is still searching for the five men he will take to Westerville, Ohio. Although he likes what he sees at practice, Fleck said his players perform differently on the course.
"If you can execute and hit good numbers in practice, then you ought to be capable of doing it and being competitive every time you tee it off," Fleck said. "If I had the reasoning, I wouldn't be trying to figure out the five guys week-in and week-out to compete. Guys have got to be ready and have got to handle the situation."
Even though the conditions were perfect, the Cardinals did not put themselves in a good position after the first round. Shooting the highest score in the second round, the Cardinals quickly put themselves in a hole.
"The differences between the morning and the afternoon were guys just weren't where they needed to be," Fleck said. "We knew it was going to be a challenging event but we just didn't play as capable as we should have. It doesn't help our confidence. There are always ups and downs when you play golf. You aren't going to hit every shot you want to, but you just have to stay focused, and we just didn't have some guys who did that."
Finding the positives and continuing onward, the Cardinals will persist their focus on the next tournament and the MAC Championships, which begin May 3.
"The number one priority is to find the five guys who will make the team successful," Fleck said. "We play well at practice but some guys become different players during the tournaments. It has to be a collective effort."
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