The Wildcats men’s golf team finished in second place shooting 843 (-21), in this year’s Wildcat Classic, played at the Links at The Rolling Hills Casino. Cal State East Bay took home first place on the team leaderboards by a whopping 12 strokes carding a 831 (-33).
Senior Travis Miller was last week’s California Collegiate Athletic Association Men’s Golfer of the Week, and backed that up with another masterful performance on the course.
Miller finished at the top of the individual leaderboards by three strokes on his birthday, Tuesday, carding a 203 (-13). Miller’s top round was also the tournament best, coming in the opening round on Monday, where he shot a 66 (-6), with seven birdies and only one bogey.
“We felt confident knowing we know the course [Rolling Hills] better and it gave us a lot of advantageous tee shots, with some of the blind shots,” Miller said. “We knew where to miss, and that gave us more freedom out there.”
Thanks to his performance at the Wildcat Classic, Miller was awarded his second consecutive CCAA Men’s Golfer of the Week honors, being the first Wildcat to do so since Josh McCollum in 2019. He is also the first CCAA golfer since Chico State’s Kyle Souza in 2011 to start the year by winning the first two awards of the season.
“All of that recognition feels fantastic. To know that my play is being recognized and the results are actually starting to show, feels great,” Miller said. “But more importantly, I just want to keep focus and keep building off what I can. There’s still things to improve on.”
Junior Naoki Easterday found his stroke, with three consecutive rounds under par, shooting a 208 (-8), finishing in solo fifth after a subpar start to the fall segment, where he scored a 221 (+5) and a 227 (+11) in the first two tournaments of the year. Easterday looked like he is regaining last seasons form where he averaged 71.93 strokes per round
Sophomore Alex LemMon found himself one stroke outside of the top 10 on the individual leaderboards tied in 11th, with a 212 (-4). LemMon’s best round was his last of the tournament, where he shot 69 (-3), with six birdies and three bogeys.
Giuliano Kaminski, who had played in the starting five in the Wildcats first two tournaments, led the way for the B-team this go around, compiling three rounds under par carding a 215 (-1).
“Our players are getting better, things are going in the right direction, scores are getting lower. So you need to have that kind of confidence and we need to maintain that momentum,” Head Coach Nick Green said.
The Wildcats are on an upward trend as of late thanks to back-to-back encouraging performances, finishing in the top three of their last two tournaments.
“The confidence is high for this group,” Green said. “Golf is an up-and-down type of sport, but that’s why we’re constantly trying to improve on the smallest aspects, and control what we are capable of controlling, and I think we’ve done a really good job of that the last couple of events.”
The team has seemed to have no problem filling the shoes of program vets Tyler Ashman and Dakota Ochoa, who had played in every tournament for Chico over the previous three seasons.
The Wildcats look to finish this fall segment strong Monday down in Seaside for the Otter Invitational. This is their last tournament of the fall session, prior to a three month hiatus before the spring segment begins.
Chico State will be teeing off early Monday morning. You can keep up with the round and scores via this link.
For information about all Chico State athletics, visit the Wildcat home page.
Lukas Mann can be reached at [email protected].
