Vols Place Fifth at Southwestern Invitational

Tuesday, February 26

Westlake Village, CA

All Day

University of Tennessee

Southwestern Invitational

February 26, 2019 | Men's Golf

Results

Tennessee has three player finish inside of the top 20 on the leaderboard with Wolcott placing 10th

By: Andy Kovar

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif. – In the opening tournament of the spring, the No. 22 University of Tennessee men's golf team finished fifth at Southwestern Invitational.

With a 54-hole score of 877 (+13), UT finished just one spot back of host No. 12 Pepperdine. The event, held at North Ranch Country Club in Westlake Village, Calif., featured four of the top five teams in the state of California who were all ranked in the top 50 by GolfStat.

The tournament also featured eight of the top 100 players in the country. Junior Hunter Wolcott was the top Tennessee player on the individual leaderboard as he tied for 10th in the event with a three-round score of 216 (E).

This is the third time this season that Wolcott has finished inside of the top 15 on the leaderboard and his second consecutive after tying for 12th at the Bank of Tennessee Intercollegiate at the end of fall.

Wolcott was one of three Vol players to place inside of the top 20 on the leaderboard. He was joined by junior Brayden Garrison (+2) and redshirt junior Nolan Ray (+5).

For Ray, this was his first time in the UT lineup this season as the team counted his score in all three rounds this week including the low score in the final round, 73 (+1). This is the second tournament of the spring for the redshirt junior after finishing third at the Georgia Southern Individual Collegiate earlier this month.

Ray finished tied for 20th individually.

Garrison picked up his third top-15 finish of the season as a final round 73 (+1) tied Ray for the low round on the team Tuesday. The junior spent nearly the entire tournament inside of the top 15 after two birdies in his first three holes of the tournament got him off to a quick start in California.

Coach's Take
On play of Nolan Ray:
"Nolan continues his solid play from Statesboro and qualifying. He has probably worked harder than anyone on our team on his game since the end of the fall season and I am happy that he is starting to see the results pay off." – Coach Brennan Webb

On the third top-15 finish for Hunter Wolcott this season:
"It's easy to recognize that Hunter is a world class talent. What people don't realize is that because of his pedigree he also realizes what it takes to succeed at the highest levels of golf and is willing to put the time and energy into these things. He has a chance to do some special things in his career." – Coach Brennan Webb

On takeaways from opening tournament of spring:
"This was a good experience coming out west and playing in this environment but, we realize that we have a lot of things to work on. We will get back to Knoxville and get working on them and be ready to go at The Linger Longer." – Coach Brennan Webb

Final Scores:
Team

1	Southern Cal	-4 (860)
2	Cal	-3 (861)
3	UCLA	+1 (865)
4	Pepperdine	+5 (869)
5	Tennessee	+13 (877)
6	San Jose State	+14 (878)
7	Oregon State	+16 (880)
8	San Diego State	+17 (881)
9	Loyola Marymount	+22 (886)
10	Washington	+26 (890)
11	George Washington	+47 (911)
12	Augusta	+50 (914)