The back-to-back SWAC champions are heading to Louisiana.
The University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff men’s golf team was selected for the Baton Rouge Regional of the NCAA tournament, hosted by LSU, the NCAA announced Wednesday.
The regional will be played at the University Club golf course May 13-15.
This is the second straight trip to regionals by UAPB, which competed in the Norman Regional hosted by Oklahoma last season. The Golden Lions only brought back one golfer this season who competed last year.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Head coach Roger Totten said it is good to be able to go back-to-back with a mostly different team.
“They came in and bought into the program,” Totten said. “When we talk about that, discipline, attitude, sacrifice and hard work. Once you put those four components together, it doesn’t matter whether you’re a senior or a freshman.”
The one returner is Ismael Garcia. The sophomore from Leon, Mexico, finished fifth in the SWAC championships last month in Flowood, Miss., after finishing second last season. He finished 66th in Norman, second-best on the team.
Totten said Garcia’s experience will be valuable in Baton Rouge.
“He saw some things I didn’t see,” Totten said. “More than that, you can sit down and learn from your peer who been there before, so that’s a great advantage for us.”
UAPB will be the 14th seed in Baton Rouge. The field is highlighted by Auburn, the overall No. 1 seed nationally. Virginia, Texas Tech, Oregon, Duke and Ohio State round out the top six, followed by host LSU at No. 7.
The rest of the field consists of Louisville, Houston, South Carolina, Lipscomb, Yale and Loyola Maryland.
The top five teams from each regional will advance to the national tournament May 24-29 in Carlsbad, Calif.
UAPB finished 14th at regionals last year. Totten, who was named SWAC coach of the year for the fifth straight season, said the biggest lesson he learned in Norman was the need to hit the ball further off the tee.
“Their courses are longer than we normally play,” Totten said. “So, we had to go out and find guys that hit the ball off the tee a little bit further. I think we’ve done that, so the lesson I learned from last year was that. We gotta get longer off the tee.”
UAPB placed two golfers on the all-SWAC first team. Garcia was joined by freshman Jose Berenguel, who finished first at the SWAC championships at 4 under par.
Berenguel, a native of Almeria, Spain, said Garcia has been a big help for him and the rest of the team.
“I talk with him a lot about the regionals, about the SWAC championship,” Berenguel said. “He told me, like, they have very good players where we are going to play. He support us a lot, too.”
UAPB also placed one player on the all-SWAC second team, freshman Jules DeRau from Gurande, France. Timur Alalin, a freshman from Kyiv, Ukraine, and Angel Soria, a sophomore from Albacete, Spain, rounded out UAPB’s five golfers at the SWAC championship.