GRAND BLANC, MI – The spring of 2014 for many sports has been struggle with the delays of getting fields ready and courses ready for play. After having to cancel a home tournament at the Cascades Golf Course last week, the Cougars turned their focus to a tournament held at one of the stats of Michigan’s most famous venues. On Monday, Spring Arbor University was afforded an opportunity to host the SAU Spring Thaw tournament at the Warwick Hills Golf and Country Club, the site of the discontinued PGA Tour’s Buick Open Championship.
When the teams arrived at the course in the early morning hours, they walked the hall of champions with the portraits of all the winners of the Buick Open, including Tiger Woods, Freddie Couples, Ben Crenshaw, Vijay Singh, and may others since the tournaments beginning in 1958 until its final year of 2009 with Woods lifting the trophy for the his third and final time.
In the collegiate tournament held Monday, the Cougars finished second of seven teams posting rounds of 325-316=641 in very windy conditions and weather that surrounded the area all day long. SAU finished 13 shots behind Mount Vernon Nazarene University who shot 317-311=628
Spring Arbor was led by Nick Ward who opened the morning round with an 81 and the closed the tournament with an afternoon round with 76 for a 157 total and a spot on the Spring Thaw’s All-Tournament team.
Cody Lysher and Tyler Owen were next on the leaderboard for Spring Arbor as Lysher turned in rounds of 81-79=160, and Owen posting 76-84=160. Chris Chaney carded rounds of 88-77-165 and Sean Sommerville completed the Cougar scoring with 87-87-174.
MVNU’s Charlie Phillips took the medalist plaque with very solid rounds of 75-72-147.