LIHUE, Hawaii — Men’s golf (281-277-290–848) closed out the 49th John A. Burns Intercollegiate in ninth at 8-over par at the Ocean Course at Hokuala Saturday.
"Played some pretty good golf at times this week, but way too many loose shots for the team to have any success," head coach Bruce Brockbank said. "We’ve been working on playing in the wind but way too inconsistent."
“We missed a couple key tee shots early on holes two and three and couldn’t quite recover today in the difficult conditions,” director of golf Todd Miller said. “This team is usually near the top in par-3 scoring, but this week we were 29-over par which was second to last in the field. For most of the tournament we hung in there even though we didn’t have our best stuff, so it’s pretty hard to finish the tournament the way we did.
LMU (276-276-278–830) secured the victory in Hawaii at 10-under par, while leading the field with 55 birdies. UNLV (281-274-279–834) and Texas A&M (277-275-284–836) shared the runner-up spot at 5-under par. The Rebels made the least bogeys of any school while the Aggies led the field in par-4 scoring. New Mexico (281-277-281–839) placed fourth at 1-under par and Long Beach State (278-282-281–841) captured a 1-over-par fifth place to cap off the top-5.
Kihei Akina (68-69-69–206) took home his fifth top-10 finish by placing sixth at 4-under par. Akina achieved his lowest 54-hole total score of his career which beat the 207 number he posted at the Arizona N.I.T. in January.
"I did everything solid," Akina said. "My driving was on point and I thought I did a great job of controlling my ball in the wind. We want to do better on par-3 scoring. As a team, we do really well on the par 4 and 5’s. This will be a good learning experience for us to get better."
"Kihei Akina had another solid performance this week to lead the team," Brockbank said.
Tyson Shelley (70-70-72–212) ended Saturday inside the top-25 at 2-over par and finished tied for 21st. This marked the senior’s 17th top-25 finish of his career.
Jackson Mauss (74-68-74–216) recorded 6-over par in the event which made him tied for 44th.
"Second round 68 for [Jackson] Mauss kept us in it after two rounds," Brockbank said.
Simon Kwon (72-70-76–218) finished tied for 55th at 8-over par. One stroke behind Kwon was Peter Kim (71-73-75–219) who shared the 58th spot at 9-over par.
As an individual, Parker Bunn (76-73-73–222) carded a 12-over par to tie for 79th.
"For the Lamkin, we have plenty of work in every aspect of the game if we want to have a good tournament in San Diego," Brockbank said.
“We will be working a lot on our distance control with our short irons and our lag putting in preparation for San Diego Country Club,” Miller said. “Hopefully, we can bounce back with a great finish like we did in the fall.”
BYU will have its sights set on its trip to San Diego for the R.E. Lamkin Invitational on March 9-10.