Springfield, Ohio – For the seventh straight year and the 23rd time in program history, the Wittenberg University men’s golf team has earned the opportunity to compete in an NCAA Tournament. The Tigers, ranked No. 8 nationally in the latest Golf Coaches Association of America poll, will compete for the 2016 NCAA Division III title May 10-13 at Midvale Country Club in Rochester, NY.
The tournament, hosted by St. John Fisher College, will include 41 teams and a total of 210 competitors. The Tigers were one of 33 teams to qualify automatically after winning the North Coast Athletic Conference (NCAC) championship for the seventh straight year and eighth time overall.
The national tournament berth is Wittenberg’s 22nd as a member of NCAA Division III and 23rd overall, including the program’s first-ever national bid in 1974 as a member of the College Division. A year ago, the Tigers finished a program-best third in the nation at the 2015 NCAA Division III Tournament hosted by Guilford College at Grandover Resort in Greensboro, NC.
The Tigers have 11 national top-10 NCAA finishes in program history. The best result before last year came in 1990, when four-time All-American Rick Lyons led the Tigers to a fourth-place finish at Jekyll Island Golf Club in Jekyll Island, Ga. Wittenberg’s third-place finish in 2015 was the program’s fourth top-10 performance under the direction of current Head Coach Jeff Roope.
Wittenberg has finished first in four of its 11 tournaments in the 2015-16 season, including wins in three straight competitions to close the campaign. The last two tournament victories combined to give the Tigers the NCAC Championship Series title by 15 strokes over runner-up Allegheny.
The Tigers head into the national competition ranked fifth in the country in scoring average. In 25 rounds, Wittenberg’s student-athletes have posted an impressive average score of 74.84 while playing one of the most challenging schedules in program history. As a team, Wittenberg’s scoring average is 295.92, highlighted by a school-record two-day total of 11-under-par 565 en route to a first-place finish in the Rosencrans-Maurer Invitational April 17-18 at historic Springfield Country Club.
Perhaps what makes the Tigers’ run back to the NCAA Division III Tournament most impressive is the fact that Roope has seamlessly replaced three starters from the 2014-15 squad. Wittenberg lost three of the best players in program history to graduation – All-Americans John Chaney and Alex Andrews and all-region standout Jared Wissinger – but the Tigers have continued to excel.
“I am so proud of everyone on this year’s team,” said Roope, who was recently named NCAC Coach of the Year for a sixth time in nine years leading the Tigers. “We have shuffled a lot of players in and out of the lineup throughout the season, and they have responded to the challenge. Every week is a competitive situation in practice, and that has carried over to tremendous achievement while playing a really tough schedule.”
Junior Garrett Brickley (Pickerington, Ohio/North) leads Wittenberg with a scoring average of 74.10, good for 48th in all of NCAA Division III. In his first year as a regular in the starting lineup, Brickley has posted six top-five finishes in the 2015-16 season, and he has earned first-team All-NCAC honors and rained semifinalist status for the Jack Nicklaus Award as the nation’s top golfer.
Senior Sam Geise (Springboro, Ohio/Springboro) is far and away the Tigers’ most experienced player, with 82.5 rounds in his collegiate career. He has played all 25 rounds in the 2015-16 season, posting a 74.28 stroke average and finishing in the top-five on four different occasions, in addition to earning first-team All-NCAC honors.
The lineup also features a pair of freshmen who have come on strong in recent weeks to earn first-team All-NCAC honors. Isaac Hartley (Bellevue, Ohio/Bellevue) has turned in three top-10 performances in five tournaments with a stroke average of 74.46, while Colin Laszlo (Waipahu, Hawaii/Punahou) has a stroke average of 74.95 and four top-10s to his credit.
Juniors Mark David Wright (Westerville, Ohio/Tree of Life) and Sam Stilwell (Sterling, Va./Dominion) are competing for the fifth and final position in the NCAA Division III Tournament lineup. Stilwell was a starter on the team a year ago, and he carries a 75.52 stroke average in 2015-16, while Wright has played all 25 rounds this year and boasts of a 75.16 stroke average and second-team All-NCAC honors.