M. Golf Places Sixth

The Harvard men’s golf team escaped the snow of New York as it tied for sixth out of the 26 teams competing at Seven Oaks Golf Course in Hamilton, NY, in the ECAC Championships.

Due to inclement weather, the tourney was cut short by one day, leaving the teams to settle for Saturday’s scores as the final measure.

The University of Hartford successfully defended its ECAC Championship title with a total of 299 after one day of play, 9 strokes ahead of runner-up Rider University.

Junior Chris Holmes led the Hawks to the title with a score of 68, four under par, taking medallist honors with the nearest individual 5 strokes behind him.

Harvard’s total score of 314 left the team knotted with Towson University for the sixth place.

“This is the second week in a row that we’ve played well,” captain Andrew Malcolm said. “It’s a great step in the right direction.”

Malcolm emerged as Harvard’s leading scorer, tying for eighth in the individual rankings after shooting a 76. In addition to leading the Crimson’s rise out on the fairways and greens, Malcolm is also guiding his team off of the course as the team’s sole senior.

“Malcolm, he’s quite a guy,” sophomore Andrew Klein said. “He’s actually an unlikely good captain. He’s the first one to be joking with us in the van and to be self-deprecating. Yet when it comes down to the night before and when you need him, he’s really there and has good perspective on what we should be doing as individuals as well as what we should be doing as a team.”

Klein tied for 16th place, shooting a 77. Freshman Matt Anis earned a tie for 20th place with his score of 78.

“It was actually encouraging, the fact that we had a freshman go out and play well,” Klein said. “It’s a very difficult transition freshman year to take your game to college and to be able to compete on a different level.”

Anis has been having little difficulty stepping up to the collegiate level and has been enjoying the team and the new atmosphere. His main obstacles have stemmed from balancing commitments.

“It’s a fun time,” Anis said. “It’s a good atmosphere. It’s not so intense that you don’t want to be there. [But Harvard] is so demanding and golf is a really demanding sport in terms of time; it’s hard to put it all together.”

Junior Joe Jackson and sophomore Steve Mungovan rounded out Harvard’s performance with scores of 83 and 84, placing them in ties for 70th and 80th place respectively.

At this early stage, it looks like the Crimson has exactly what it takes to put it all together well with a strong veteran presence and talented newcomers. A fresh intensity has permeated Harvard’s game as the players have adopted a new attitude in which lax effort is not acceptable.

“Even if it’s just practice, you’re always playing for something,” Malcolm said. “It reminds people that we’re not here to play golf in country clubs, we’re here to compete.”

Harvard hopes to take its momentum into next weekend, when it will play in the Yale Fall Invitational, an affair originally scheduled for September 15-16, but postponed due to the events of September 11.