Wake Forest Athletics
Monday Morning Golf Report
2/9/2009 12:00:00 AM | Men's Golf
Feb. 9, 2009
Bill Haas and Webb Simpson each carded rounds of 2-under 70 on Sunday to each post another top-20 finish at the PGA Tour's Buick Invitational in La Jolla, Calif.
Haas, who was coming off a missed cut last week, posted four solid rounds of 72-70-72-70 to finish tied for 11th which was his second top-15 finish this season after finishing tied for 9th at the Sony Open last month.
Simpson, who made his fourth cut in as many tries, finished a couple of shots behind Haas after rounds of 72-73-71-70 put him tied for 19th. Out of 16 rounds tournament rounds this season, Simpson has posted 13 rounds at par or better.
Cortland Lowe, a 2003 Wake Forest graduate, Monday qualified for the Buick and got off to a great start, shooting 1-under 71 on the North course. He then shot even-par on the tougher south course on Friday to make the cut at 1-under.
However, Lowe struggled in the tough conditions on Saturday and would fall victim to the new PGA Tour cut rule that tries to get the field lowered to as close to 70 players as possible to avoid conflicts with TV coverage. Lowe gets credit for making the cut and cashed a check but was one of 14 players that didn't play on Sunday.
Billy Andrade was making his second start of the season but didn't get anything going and would miss the two-day cut.
The Nationwide Tour got underway this weekend at the Panama Digicel Championship in Panama City, Mexico.
2008 Wake Forest Hall of Fame Inductee Len Mattiace had a good start to his 2009 season with a tie for 6th in Panama. Mattiace made the cut by just two shots but a sensational 6-under 64 in the third round vaulted him to just a shot off the lead heading into Sunday.
Mattiace wound up finishing sixth after carding a 2-over 72 in the final round.
Ron Whittaker and Kyle Reifers also got their Nationwide Tour season's started in Panama over the weekend but each player failed to make the cut.
The PGA Tour heads to famed Pebble Beach for the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro Am while the Nationwide Tour will take a week off before heading down under for the Moonah Classic on Feb. 26 - March 1.
The Champions Tour returns to action next week at the Allianz Championship in Boca Raton, Florida. Former Deacon Lanny Wadkins, who missed most of last season due to back surgury, is poised to get back to action this spring. PGATour.com's Vartan Kupelian wrote a good article on Wadkins and his outlook for `09.
The LPGA Tour will also hold its first full-field event next weekend in Hawaii at the SBS OPEN at Turtle Bay.
Players Mentioned
