SANTA CRUZ, Calif. – Men’s golf (357-347–704) is in sixth place after the opening 36 holes of the 78th Western Intercollegiate at Pasatiempo Golf Course on Tuesday.
“Yesterday we did not play to our potential,” Director of Golf Todd Miller said. “The guys were good mentally, but they just weren’t sharp with their execution. Today, we came out and made some birdies early when the course was playing tough which sustained us throughout the round. You know the course is difficult when only two teams shot under par all day long, so it was nice to be one of those teams. Hopefully that gives us some momentum going into tomorrow and we can move up the leaderboard again.”
Peter Kim (70-66–136) continued to lead BYU after the second day of play with a 4-under 66. The Salt Lake City native carded five birdies, tied for the fourth most among all players on the day. He also ranked second among individual competitors on par-3 holes, averaging 2.90. Kim is tied for eighth.
“I played good,” Kim said. “My putting was great. I made several 6-foot crucial saves that kept my momentum going. I want to get after it tomorrow, so catching the lead would be great. I need to make a lot of birdies.”
No. 22 Pepperdine leads the competition at 6-under with No. 18 San Diego State behind them with their 4-under 696. No. 21 Arizona is in third and Nihon and Stanford rounded out the top five.
Cole Ponich shot a 1-under 69 today to help him rise 17 spots on the leaderboard. Ponich made four birdies today to put him in a tie for 17th.
Junior Simon Kwon (72-70–142) is tied for 29th after he shot even par in today’s round. Tyson Shelley and Zac Jones are each tied for 38th. Shelley made four birdies in the second round.
Kevin Wu is tied for 63rd at 8-over par.
The Cougars tee off in their final round tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. MST. Follow live scoring on Scoreboard or watch live coverage on Golf Channel at 5 p.m. MST.