HUTCHINSON, Kansas – The format of this year's NCAA men's golf championship may be significantly altered on the fly, and – this may surprise you – television may be part of the reason.
The tournament at Prairie Dunes Country Club was scheduled to begin Friday with the first of three rounds of team stroke play after which the top eight teams would advance to match play. A new wrinkle was instituted this year, a fourth round on Monday for the top 40 finishers plus ties, to determine the individual champion. Match play was to follow with two rounds Tuesday and the championship match Wednesday.
This is also the year that the Golf Channel is beginning what a network news release called “unprecedented coverage” of the event, including three hours of live coverage of the fourth round.
However, eight hours of rain delays pushed most of the first round to Saturday, when half the field played as many as 36 holes. The hope for Sunday is to have the half of the field that has played only one round thus far complete as many of their remaining 36 holes as possible, and the other half (which has already played two rounds, or most of it) to play their third round, as well.
However, there’s a 40 percent chance of rain for Sunday, according to the Weather Channel, which could make the completion of 54 holes of play by Sunday night impossible. The NCAA men’s golf committee was monitoring the situation and considering a variety of options, NCAA spokesman Rick Nixon said. Among them was cutting down the field after 36 holes instead of 54.
Nixon also acknowledged that the interests of television would be a factor in the decision making, though he added it would be the NCAA golf committee’s decision. It would not be a tremendous leap in logic, though, to conclude that the Golf Channel would like to preserve the individual round for its Monday broadcast rather than other options, for instance the completion of the third round and the scrapping of the fourth round.
“If they don’t get 54 in, that’s going to be a big problem,” Tech junior Ollie Schniederjans said. “I think they need to get over this whole individual (champion) thing and use that day to make sure we get 54 holes in as a team. This is a team tournament, not an individual (tournament). This is college golf, not the Masters.”
It is a variation on a theme seen more frequently with college football and men’s basketball, the latter being played virtually on every day except Sunday and Monday and the former starting games at 9 p.m. to placate the demands of TV partners.
The Golf Network is making no small investment in an event that doesn’t draw significant attention, with a set at the country club and more than 20 hours of live news and tournament coverage originating from the site.
A 36-hole cut would be a considerable change. The tournament was played as a four-round event from 1968 to 2008, with low scores determining the individual and team champions. Beginning with the 2009 tournament, the event switched to 54 holes, at which point the individual champion and the eight teams advancing to match play were determined. Nearly all college golf tournaments are 54-hole events.
As an alternative, the NCAA could open the match-play field to 16 teams if it shortens the team stroke play portion to 36 holes, Nixon said.
Even prior to the event, Tech coach Bruce Heppler was not a proponent of the fourth round to crown the individual champion, and was presumably even less so Saturday.
Tech needs to play more holes, because if the cut is made after 36 holes, the Jackets may be eliminated, ending a season for a team with national-title aspirations. They are in a tie for 10th at 1-under par and have finished two rounds. Of the 10 teams that are either ahead of Tech or tied with the Jackets, three have also played two rounds, five have only played one round and two were out on the course playing their second rounds when play was called Saturday night due to darkness.
“I’m the least interested out here in who’s in the individual thing, so I don’t know what their plans are,” Heppler said. “Hopefully we can get 54 holes in and we’ll worry about that individual stuff when it happens. Hopefully, we’ll get to play more holes.”
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