Texas A&M junior Walker Lee finished sixth place at the Maridoe Intercollegiate, shooting six-over to help the No. 12 Aggies secure a second place finish on Tuesday.
In a tournament dominated by defending champions No. 18 SMU, the Aggies managed to fight off the rest of the pack on the final day to tie with San Francisco for second place.
The Mustangs shot three strokes better than they did last year en route to winning this year’s tournament at 18-over; however, this was not the case for the rest of the teams, who noticeably struggled with second place shooting 42-over par.
Although they did not perform to the best of their abilities, the Aggies managed to shoot eight strokes better than No. 8 Washington.
The Aggies managed to pull out a second-place finish despite shooting their worst score of the season and their worst round on the final day. Despite finishing in a tie for second, A&M shot just four strokes better than the seventh place team in the tournament.
“Today did not go to plan for us,” coach J.T. Higgins told 12thman.com. “The course setup was tough, and we did not have the patience or discipline to put together the round we needed. When you couple that with three putts, penalty shots and big numbers, it’s pretty tough to put a good round together.”
Lee, the 2018 defending champion, finished in a tie for sixth at six-over after shooting a four-over 76 during his final round. Senior Brandon Smith finished tied for eighth at seven-over after firing a five-over 77 on his final round.
The Aggies’ No. 1 golfer going into the tournament, senior Josh Gliege, shot 25-over finishing tied for 59th. Senior Dan Erickson followed closely, and shot 14-over landing himself a 26th place finish.
Freshman Jimmy Lee was unable to build off of his outstanding performance at the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship, and finished in the middle of the pack at 15-over par.
“We will learn from this and be better for it but for tonight we will lick our wounds, reflect on what we need to do better and then get back after it tomorrow,” Higgins said.
The Aggies finish their fall season at the Golf Club of Georgia Collegiate in Atlanta hosted by Georgia Tech from Oct. 18-20.