May 12, 2008

NCAA East Regional Tournament Notes

AUBURN - The No. 16 Auburn men's golf team will play in the NCAA East Regional at the par-71, 6,961-yard Council Fire Golf Club in Chattanooga, Tenn., May 15-17 in a field that includes eight teams and individuals ranked in the May 4 Golfweek top-25.

Leading the Tigers in the No. 1 spot is first-team All-SEC senior Jay Moseley, who has a 71.40 stroke average. In the No. 2 position is All-SEC junior Glenn Northcutt (72.48) followed by All-SEC senior Patton Kizzire (73.26), senior Gordon Strother (73.10) and senior Steven Groover (74.38).

"Groover is playing particularly well as of late," said head coach Mike Griffin. "One of our seniors, Gordon Strother, transferred to us from Chattanooga and has played this course before. He's told us a little about it.

"This is a real neat looking golf course - very straight forward. It looks to lend itself to scoring if a team gets hot."

The East Regional teams, in order of seeding, are No. 2 Georgia, No. 9 Charlotte, No. 12 South Carolina, No. 14 Duke, No. 13 UT-Chattanooga, No. 16 Auburn, No. 21 East Tennessee State, No. 20 Michigan State, Ole Miss, UAB, Virginia tech , NC State, Mississippi State, Georgia State, North Florida, UC-Irvine, Augusta State, SMU, Middle Tennessee State, Coastal Carolina, Memphis, Virginia, Western Carolina, Colorado State, New Mexico State, Western Illinois and Jackson State. Individuals in the East Regional, in order of seeding, are St. John's Keegan Bradley, New Orleans's Jose Toledo, South Alabama's Johnny Caldwell, Troy's Michael McGrady, Vanderbilt's Jon Curran and Austin Peay State's Grant Leaver.

"We're ready to go," said Moseley. "It's been a good week of preparation and our frame of mind is right. If we play well, everything will take care of itself. We can compete with anybody on this type of course."

Moseley, recently named first-team All-SEC, leads all Tigers in stroke average, top-5 finishes (3), rounds in the 60s (8), sub-par rounds (16). Moseley was ranked 22nd nationally in the May 4 Golfweek individual Top-25 with a 72.86 rating.

Other top-25 individuals competing in the East Regional are Georgia State's Joel Sjoholm (No. 5), Georgia's Adam Mitchell (No. 10), East Tennessee State's Gareth Shaw (No. 11), Georgia's Russell Henley (No. 16), Charlotte's Jonas EnenderHedin (No. 18), UAB's Zack Sucher (No. 20) and Georgia's Hudson Swafford (No. 24).

Auburn is making its ninth-consecutive Regional appearance and 19th in the last 20 years. The Tigers have advanced to the NCAA Championship in each of their last five East Regional appearances.

Against those schools competing in the East Regional, Auburn has amassed a record of 26-17-1 (.605) over the course of the 2007-08 season.

"There are some good teams at the top," said Griffin. "Looking all the way through this field, there are about 15 teams that I could see making a run. It's a very deep field. Anybody could make the top-10."

The top 10 teams and two individuals not on those teams qualify for the 111th NCAA Men's Golf Championship at The Kampen Course in West Lafayette, Ind., May 28-31.

First round action begins for the Tigers at 11:48 am Thursday as Auburn tees off the back nine with Duke and UT-Chattanooga. Live scoring will be available via Golfstat (www.golfstat.com).