The golf team played in the NCAA Regional tournament on Saturday, Sept. 29 through Monday, Oct. 1. The Wildcats finished the match in 21st place out of 24 teams with an overall score of 638.

Head coach Dean Ellis said the ’Cats had a great first round, and a few players in particular stood out to him.

“We had some individuals who played well,” Ellis said. “Patrick Sweeney had a good round for us, along with Jared Reid. Ben Johnson had a good weekend the whole time.”

The tournament was set up in a way the ’Cats were not used to, normally the team plays two days on one course with a practice round to start it off. This tournament was so large that the teams had to be split up into two different courses with a practice round on only one.

Junior Jared Reid said the team did not play very well in the new tournament format and although the practice round on the first course helped them significantly, their scores were still not high enough to make up for the second day.

“We didn’t have any idea what was on the second course,” Reid said. “When you play a course for the first time, you really have no idea what is in front of you and where the trouble is. That is what really hurt us, we were inexperienced and found ourselves in bad spots.”

Ellis said the second day started off badly, and that affected the outcome significantly.

“Overall we had a tough time the second day and a good start the first day so hopefully we will be able to put something together for the future,” Ellis said.

Reid said he was disappointed in his individual performance despite his initial positive attitude towards the tournament.

“I played well coming in and I thought I was going to have a good week but I just made some mental errors and I couldn’t finish out the rounds,” Reid said.

Reid said the team had worked on their short game prior to the weekend’s match, and as the week goes on, they will continue to prepare.

“We are all working on parts of our game like the short game but we are hoping that we can put it all together for the conference,” Reid said.

Reid stated the team has not yet been able to play to their full potential, and they are hoping to become more consistent as the season continues.

“We are all really underachieving right now,” Reid said. “We are looking for some better consistency and play in two weeks for conference, that is our biggest meet of the year and we are hoping to play well.”

The ’Cats will be competing in the GLIAC championship Oct. 13-16 in Elyria, Ohio.