Michel, Blackmon top seeds as Cotton States matches start
Kyle Michel
MONROE, La. (July 25, 2018) – The match-play bracket is set at the W.E. Cole Cotton States Invitational, and now the real fun begins. Thirty-two players advanced to the next leg of the tournament at Bayou DeSiard Country Club.
After 36 holes of stroke play, Australian Kyle Michel and Texan Brody Blackmon shared the stop spot. Both got to 6 under. Michel drew the top seed while Blackmon, the Ole Miss senior, will start match play as the No. 2 seed.
Behind the leaders, three players finished 36 holes at 5 under and tied for third. Those players included Keegan McLachlan, Peyton Wilhoit and Sean Wilcox. McLachlan, of South Africa, is headed to Louisiana-Monroe in the fall. Wilhoit is the leading scorer for Southern Illinois and Wilcox is a redshirt sophomore at Tennessee.
First-round leaders Grayson Jones and Isaiah Jackson, who started with 67, fell down the leaderboard with second-round scores of 75 and 78, respectively. Both still made match play, however. The cut to make the bracket fell at 3 over.
ABOUT THE Cotton States Amateur
Originally played in 1949 as the Bayou
DeSiard Labor Day Golf Tournament, the
tournament's
name was changed to the Cotton States
Invitational in 1951 by the club's young head
professional, W. E. "Winnie" Cole. He felt that
the
name better reflected the main states that the
tournament's players originated from (and a
move
to
mid-summer made the name a necessity later
anyway). Little did Cole know that 27 years
later, in
1978, the event would be renamed again,
forever to
be known as the W. E. Cole Cotton States
Invitational Golf Tournament.
Past champions of this highly competitive, yet
festive
tournament include Don January and Hal
Sutton. Gil
Morgan, David
Toms and many other PGA Tour players have
also
competed. The tournament field field is limited
to 96
amateur
participants
having a verified USGA Handicap Index not
exceeding 0.0. Long a match play event, the
format was changed in 2021 to 72 holes of
stroke play.
View Complete Tournament Information