THE FLATS – Making its third trip to the West Coast and beyond this spring, Georgia Tech’s 15th-ranked golf team heads to San Francisco, Calif., to compete against a large, nationwide field in The Goodwin, which is played Thursday through Saturday at TPC Harding Park golf course.
The Yellow Jackets, No. 15 in the Scoreboard collegiate rankings and No. 11 in the Bushnell/GCAA coaches poll, are facing the largest field of any tournament on Tech’s schedule. Thirty-one teams will play 18 holes each day, with tee times starting 10 a.m. EDT from the first and 10th tees. Ten of the competing teams are listed in the top 50 of the current Scoreboard NCAA Golf Rankings, including Tech (15), Tennessee (7), California (19), Georgia (22) and Oregon (24) in the top 25.
Tech has three starters back from a team that won the program’s 19th Atlantic Coast Conference championship and posted a runner-up finish at the NCAA Championship last spring, including seniors Bartley Forrester (Gainesville, Ga.) and Christo Lamprecht (George, South Africa) and sophomore Hiroshi Tai (Singapore). They have formed the core of the Tech lineup this spring along with freshmen Kale Fontenot (Lafayette, La.) and Carson Kim (Yorba Linda, Calif.).
Tech has two tournaments remaining on its spring schedule, The Goodwin and the Calusa Cup on April 7-9, before heading to Charlotte, N.C., in mid-April to defend its ACC title.
Hiroshi Tai has finished in the top 12 in each of Tech’s last three tournaments. (photo by Clyde Click)
TECH LINEUP – Head coach Bruce Heppler, in his 29th year coaching the Yellow Jackets, has utilized the same starting five for all four spring events and will do so again for The Goodwin.
Lamprecht is currently ranked the No. 1 amateur in the world, No. 2 in the PGA Tour University ranking, and No. 4 in the Scoreboard collegiate ranking. The 6-8 senior won twice in the fall, winning the Olympia Fields/Fighting Illini Invitational and the Ben Hogan Collegiate Invitational, and missed a third victory by one stroke at the Watersound Invitational in early February. He owns a team-best 69.00 stroke average, which is on pace to set a Tech program record.
Tai has finished in the top 20 of Tech’s last six tournaments dating back to the fall, including a tie for seventh (Watersound Invitational), fifth (RE Lamkin Invitational) and 12th (Linger Longer Invitational) in the last three. Listed No. 79 in the latest Scoreboard ranking, Tai is a combined 31 strokes under par for his 12th spring rounds.
Fontenot is No. 96 in the Scoreboard rankings with top-30 finishes in each of the Yellow Jackets’ last three tournaments, while Forrester (No. 196) has four top-20 showings in eight tournaments this year. Kim has steadily improved this spring, climbing from 78th at the Amer Ari Invitational to 22nd at the Linger Longer.
Sophomore Aidan Tran (Fresno, Calif.), who has competed in five events this year, including a tie for 12th place at the Linger Longer Invitational last week, will compete as an individual.
TOURNAMENT INFORMATION – This is Georgia Tech’s fourth appearance at The Goodwin, having finished second behind Oklahoma in last year’s event, while Christo Lamprecht took home runner-up honors individually. The event is named for legendary head coach Wally Goodwin who led the Cardinal program from 1987-2000 and is played at one of the country’s elite courses, with TPC Harding Park set to host the event for the third time in school history after serving as headquarters in 2018. TPC Harding Park has played host to numerous PGA Tour events, including the 2009 Presidents Cup and the 2020 PGA Championship. TPC Harding Park will be set up as a 6,939-yard, par-70 layout.
The format is the traditional 54 holes, 18 holes each day from Thursday through Saturday, with the low four scores out of five counting for the team total each day.
The field is the largest that the Yellow Jackets will play against all year, 31 teams, including Appalachian State, BYU (43), California (19), Cal Baptist, Cal Davis, Cal Poly, Clemson, Colorado, Georgia (22), Georgia Tech (15), Howard, Lipscomb, Little Rock, Long Beach State (48), Nevada, Oregon (25), Oregon State, Pepperdine, San Diego, San Diego State (29), San Jose State, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Southern California, Stanford (44), Tennessee (7), TCU, UCLA (33), Utah, Utah Tech, Washington State.
Host Stanford has won the tournament 16 times since the inaugural event in 1968. Past individual winners include major golf champions Tom Watson and Corey Pavin, as well as veteran PGA Tour pros like Duffy Waldorf and Billy Mayfair, and younger pros like Nick Taylor, Patrick Rodgers, Maverick McNealy and Brandon Wu.
Alexander-Tharpe Fund
The Alexander-Tharpe Fund is the fundraising arm of Georgia Tech athletics, providing scholarship, operations and facilities support for Tech’s 400-plus student-athletes. Be a part of the development of Yellow Jackets that thrive academically at the Institute and compete for championships at the highest levels of college athletics by supporting the Annual Athletic Scholarship Fund, which directly provides scholarships for Georgia Tech student-athletes. To learn more about supporting the Yellow Jackets, visit atfund.org.
ABOUT GEORGIA TECH GOLF
Georgia Tech’s golf team is in its 29th year under head coach Bruce Heppler, having won 72 tournaments in his tenure. Heppler is the 10th-longest-tenured head coach in Division I men’s golf. The Yellow Jackets have won 19 Atlantic Coast Conference Championships, made 33 appearances in the NCAA Championship and been the national runner-up five times. Connect with Georgia Tech Golf on social media by liking their Facebook page, or following on Twitter (@GTGolf) and Instagram. For more information on Tech golf, visit Ramblinwreck.com.
