Men's Golf 11/3/2019 12:47:00 PM

GOLF | Gaels to Host 14th Annual SMC Invitational

MORAGA, Calif. — Saint Mary's will head down to Poppy Hills, Calif. from Nov. 4-6 to host the 14th annual Saint Mary's Invitational at the Poppy Hills Golf Club to complete their 2019 fall schedule.

TOURNAMENT INFO
Date: November 4-6, 2019
Host: Saint Mary's
Location: Pebble Beach, Calif.
Course: Poppy Hills Golf Club
Par/Yardage: Par-71, 7002 yards
Field: 16 teams
Live Scoring: http://results.golfstat.com//public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=participants&tid=19228

THE LINEUP
The Gaels will send two teams to the invitational, with one team consisting of five individuals. In the first team, the lineup will be Blake Hathcoat, Ash Hakim, Michael Slesinski, Ethan Farnam, and Evan Peterson.

Competing as individuals for the Saint Mary's "B" Team will be Dylan VanderVeer, Jeffrey Inouye-Wong, Ethan Ashbrook, Kent Kao, and Ronnie Hun.

THE FIELD
Alongside Saint Mary's, the 15 teams competing in the field are Arizona, BYU, Coastal Carolina, Colorado State, Fresno State, Oregon, Oregon State, New Mexico, Pacific, San Diego State, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Toledo, UNC Wilmington, and Utah.

Within this field, five teams are listed in the Golfstat top-50 including four that are in the top-25: BYU (6), Arizona (14), Oregon State (17), and Colorado State (20). Saint Mary's is currently ranked No. 64.

THE COURSE
Nestled in beautiful Pebble Beach, Poppy Hills will host the Saint Mary's invitational for the fifth consecutive year.

Poppy Hills became the first course to be owned and operated by a golf association in the U.S. when the Northern California Golf Association built it to serve as its headquarters and tournament home. Opened on June 1, 1986, the Robert Trent Jones Jr. design has since co-hosted the PGA Tour's AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am from 1991 through 2009, as well as the Spalding Pebble Beach Invitational (1989, 1990, 1992 and 1993) and 1991 NCAA Championships.

Poppy Hills underwent an extensive renovation beginning in March of 2013 centered around water conservation, primarily by improving irrigation and drainage. Jones returned to Poppy Hills with his Robert Trent Jones II design firm, this time creating a firm, fast and fun course that unfolds seamlessly through the stunning Del Monte Forest.

Jones reinvented the course architecturally, restoring each hole to its natural elevation along the forest floor, softening doglegs and contours, rebuilding all 18 greens with bentgrass, eliminating rough and introducing native waste areas that reduce irrigated turf by nearly 25%.

The new Poppy Hills reopened April 4, 2014 and currently hosts the Champions Tour's Pure Insurance Championship in conjunction with the First Tee Program.

LAST TIME OUT
Saint Mary's played in the Pacific Invitational at Stockton where the Gaels sent four individuals to compete. Peterson led the Gaels' efforts as he finished at 5-over and tied for 50th in the field.

VanderVeer and Ashbrook each completed the tournament just a few strokes back of Peterson has they finished at 8-over. Rounding out the field for the Gaels was Hun who improved by 10 strokes in the final round with 14 pars and one birdie. The tournament for Hun was his first collegiate tournament of his career.

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