Oct. 10, 2004
ATLANTA – With eight members of the nation’s top 25 teams in the 12-team field, Georgia Tech will begin play Monday in the Jerry Pate National Intercollegiate at Old Overton Golf Club in Birmingham, Ala.
Tech, the nation’s second-ranked team in the Golf Coaches poll, along with Alabama, Alabama-Birmingham, Auburn, Augusta State, Clemson, Georgia, Oklahoma State, Southern California, TCU, Vanderbilt and Wake Forest, will play 36 holes Monday on the par-71 layout, with the final 18 holes scheduled for Tuesday.
Led by freshman Kevin Larsen’s five-under-par 208 score, Tech finished eighth in this event last fall, 28 shots off the pace of Oklahoma State. No Tech team has ever won the Jerry Pate event, but Bryce Molder won medalist honors in 2000.
Seniors Nicholas Thompson (Coral Springs, Fla.) and Chan Song (Orlando, Fla.), both 2004 All-Americans, lead the Yellow Jackets in this year’s event, and Tech’s five-man team also includes sophomore Roberto Castro (Alpharetta, Ga.), last year’s ACC Rookie of the Year, and juniors Mike Barbosa (St. Petersburg, Fla.) and Thomas Jordan (Sea Island, Ga.).
It is the same five who powered Tech to a second-place finish at the Golfweek Preview in the Yellow Jackets’ first fall tournament two weeks ago. Castro led the Tech effort there by tying for seventh place with a one-over-par score of 211, while Song tied for 12th (214) and Barbosa tied for 16th (215). Thompson missed finishing in the top 20 by a shot, tying for 24th at 218, and Jordan closed with rounds of 70-71 to tie for 27th at 219.
There is no live scoring for the event, but results will be posted on Ramblinwreck.com each day as soon as they are made available.
