The tournament today will be a good opportunity to erase memories of WNEC, where the four-man contingent emerged with an overall score of 348. Senior co-captain Andy Bruns led the Jeffs with a 79. Fellow senior co-captain Sean Jules started out well but ran into difficulties as the day wore on to finish with a 91. Will Collins '09 overtook him with a score of 84, and Judd Olanoff '08 rounded out the scoring with a 94. Overall, the team finished in tenth place out of 12 schools, four rungs behind Williams on the ladder.
"We were really lucky to play on the first warm day of spring, but the weather had been so bad that the course was just not ready for play and neither were we," said Bruns. "We saw a lot of really good putts get bounced offline by footprints and the like, and we didn't handle these difficulties as well as we would have liked. Not being able to hold a qualifier and send our best players is devastating. When I think of how few times we've been able to send our best five to a weekday tournament over the last four years, it's infuriating."
All is not lost, however. Today's match on home turf will give the team added advantage, especially if Amherst students, parents, and faculty show up to support the team.
"We're really pumped because we feel that we match up well against Williams and Wesleyan," said Bruns. "Three years ago we were one match away from winning, and we're a lot stronger top-to-bottom this year." Tee off is at 8 am, with afternoon matches following at 1:30 p.m.