A Good Walk Spoiled at HYP

In its first tournament of the year, the Harvard men's golf team must surely have been feeling the effects of the unpredictable New England weather.

With clear skies and warm weather in the horizon, however, the Crimson is looking to put its disappointing third place finish at the annual Harvard-Yale-Princeton (HYP) Tournament behind it and start anew.

It's first challenge comes today at the Yale Spring Invitational in New Haven, Connecticut.

Yale 388, Princ. 403, Harvard 417

After compiling 417 points and with only one player hitting under 80 for the day, there was little for Harvard to be happy about on the ride home from the HYP Tournament.

"We were let down," senior Louis Sanchez, a co-captain, said. "We didn't even come close to the way we had hoped to finish."

The one bright spot for the Crimson was sophomore Craig MacDonald who shot a team-leading 78 for the day. Not only was this the most notable Crimson performance, but it was also the fourth best overall score among all competitors.

MacDonald, also a standout forward on the men's hockey team, had broken the 80 barrier once before this past fall at the Wildcat Invitational in Salem, N.H. with a similar round of 78.

Behind MacDonald, four Crimson golfers huddled around the mid-80 mark. Junior Alex Gonzalez and freshman Steve Ranere, in his best collegiate performance, both finished the tournament with an 84, while Sanchez and junior Andy Rourke shot 85 and 86 respectively.

The Crimson needed more fire power than that considering that Yale's top gun, Scott Brinker, shot a tournament-leading 72. Following closely behind were teammates Ken Rizvi (75) and Peter Schumacher (76) who effectively helped the Elis extend their lead over the pack, leaving Harvard and Princeton battling for the coveted runner-up spot.

In the end, however, MacDonald's performance was not enough to even edge out the Tigers.

A huge factor in the HYP was the weather and the home-course advantage. After being dumped with more than two-feet of snow, the local Boston golf courses have been under the weather, leaving the Harvard team with only the indoor golf cages to practice in. Compare that to the meager two inches of white stuff which fell upon the Princeton and New Haven areas.

"The course itself played pretty hard," Ranere said. "Coming off winter, it was pretty wet and the greens were often bumpy so it was anyone's guess, especially for us and Princeton, how the greens were going to treat us."

Even now with the snow melted, the Crimson must still travel to Rhode Island or even the Cape in order to find playable courses.

"[Planning practice time] has required a lot of organization," Sanchez said. "But we're practicing closer and closer to home now; the hardest part of the season is over."

In addition to the weather constraints, the last official outing for the Crimson dates back to the end of October when the team competed in the New England Intercollegiate Championships. In an overwhelmingly dense field, the Crimson landed in 13th place out of the 47 competing teams.

Since then the team journeyed to Mexico for spring break where it enjoyed over a week of sun and 18 holes of golf each day.

"We were coming back from Mexico where the ball travels a lot farther, and the greens play a lot differently," Ranere explained. "[Yale] was a wakeup call for us because of the hard grounds and the wet conditions."

Glaringly absent from the Mexican trip was MacDonald, who stayed home due to a coach's decision. Considering his showing this past weekend, it appears that going South isn't the cure for all.

Remedies, weather and questionable decisions aside, however, the Crimson has a golden opportunity to rebound from last weekend's disappointing HYP Tournament and make its mark at the Yale Invitational today.

"We're hoping to come back and get revenge on the course," Sanchez said. "Hopefully, we'll all shoot under 80 and win the tough spots.

"The HYP tournament was early in the season and we can't place that much importance on it. Our games are still coming back. It's unfortunate that as soon as we came back from spring break, the blizzard hit. But we're taking a strong team into the weekend," he added.

Rich Tenorio contributed to the reporting of this story.