After three days of competition, the LSU men’s golf team came just one spot away from grabbing its first Southeastern Conference title since 1987.
The Tigers were unable to catch Alabama, who won the tournament for the third-straight year, shooting a tournament score of 34-under par.
LSU finished the tournament at 18-under par in its second place finish after a final round team score of 17-under.
The Tigers went into Sunday in fourth place at 1-under, four shots behind South Carolina and Auburn, who were tied for second at 5-under.
With first seemingly out of the picture for the rest of the field due to Alabama holding on to a 17-shot lead at 22-under through the first two rounds, the Tigers set their sights on second place and their golfers delivered the required performance.
The Tigers’ 17-under final day performance was led by senior Smylie Kaufman. The Alabama native came into day three at 5-under-par, leading all other Tigers.
On day three, Kaufman blew his two round total out of the water with a 6-under 64 performance putting him at 11-under-par for the tournament.
Kaufman’s performance was good enough to give him second place individually, finishing only behind Alabama’s Bobby Wyatt who finished at 18-under.
Kaufman capped off his SEC career by besting his previous 54-hole low of 2012 with his 199 overall at the SEC tournament.
Though the performance by Kaufman was huge for the Tigers over the weekend, the whole squad followed behind him, as the other four golfers all shot under par in round three to catapult the Tigers to their second place finish.
Juniors Ben Taylor and Curtis Thompson both shot rounds of 3-under on Sunday, helping them finish tied for 13th with a tournament total of 2-under-par.
The biggest mover on day three for the Tigers besides Kaufman was sophomore Zach Wright. Wright came into Sunday at 10-over-par, noticeably struggling on days one and two. On day three, he settled in and shot an impressive 5-under-par to move him from 60th to tied for 36th, giving the Tigers the performance they needed to secure second place.
The Tigers finished with a seven-shot lead over third place Auburn and an 11-shot lead over fourth place Georgia.
LSU’s strong performance in the tournament greatly improves from an 11th place finish in last year’s tournament and gives the Tigers plenty of momentum heading into the NCAA Championships beginning on May 27.