LSU men’s golf coach Chuck Winstead may be able to tell the future.
He predicted Saturday his team’s scores were going to be higher than normal at the Querencia Cabo Collegiate Championship in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, and they were. No. 3 LSU completed the three-day tournament, which began Sunday and ended Tuesday, at 14-over par, 866.
“This course in Cabo San Lucas the scores will be higher,” Winstead said before the event. “There will be more adversity. I am looking forward to seeing how we stand when facing adversity on a harder golf course.”
LSU began the final round facing adversity, sitting in 13th place out of 14 teams. The Tigers went on to shoot a 3-under par, 281, jumping six teams to finish in a tie for seventh place. Tuesday was the only round during the event the Tigers (56-16-3) shot under par.
The Tigers must come back down to earth after shattering the leaderboards in their debut tournament with a tournament-low team score of 21-under par Feb. 16-18 in the Prestige tournament at PGA West in La Quinta, California.
LSU shot 19 birdies on the final day of the Querencia Cabo Championship, ending its round at 3-under par. LSU had four of its five competitors finish the day at even or under par.
Junior Zach Wright led the team at 1-under par for the event. Wright shot for a team-low round of 2-under, 69 on the final day, which boosted him into a tie for 10th place overall.
All-American senior Stewart Jolly and sophomore Eric Ricard and Brandon Pierce finished their final rounds at 1-under and matching even-pars, respectively.
Pierce finished second for the Tigers in the tournament by shooting a 3-over par, 216. He ended this week four strokes behind Wright, edging himself into tie at 20th.
Ricard completed his run in Mexico two strokes behind his fellow sophomore teammate at 5-over par. Ricard finished his final round at even-par, jumping eight players to end his week at 31st out of 70 golfers.
Jolly finished the tournament at 9-over par, and senior Myles Lewis ended at 16-over par. Lewis is coming off of a career-low round in the Tigers debut tournament, during which he shot for a 7-under par, 65.
The Tigers have a short break until their next competition March 15-16 at the Talis Park Challenge in Naples, Florida.