The Georgia Tech golf team advanced into the fourth round Monday morning by winning a five-man playoff with TCU for the final spot in the 15-team field at the NCAA championships in Scottdale, Ariz.
With each player playing a different hole (Nos. 14-18 at Grayhawk Golf Club), starting at 7:30 a.m. local time, the Yellow Jackets played the five holes in a combined 20 strokes, 1-over par, while the Horned Frogs needed 23 shots, 3-over par.
Tech collected pars from Christo Lamprecht, Connor Howe and Ben Smith with Bartley Forrester’s birdie on the par-4 14th negating a double-bogey by Noah Norton at the par-4 17th. Four TCU players bogied and one parred.
The fourth round was to begin later Monday morning, with Tech teeing off at 10 a.m. local time (1 p.m. EST). The top eight teams will advance into match play. The Jackets were to start the round 19 shots behind the cut line and needing to pass seven teams to make it to match play. A 19-shot lead is significant. If Tech were to repeat its best score of the first three rounds and one of the three teams tied for sixth (at the cut line) were to repeat the worst score of the three teams’ combined nine rounds, the Jackets would gain only five shots.
That the Jackets were in the playoff was a surprise after they had finished the third round Sunday in a tie for 24th, six shots off the cut line. But, with half the field only beginning their rounds for the day at that time, enough teams eventually tripped up for Tech to improve to its tie for 15th.
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