Arizona hangs on to win its own National Invitational Tournament
Arizona Athletics photo
The Arizona Wildcats came from four shots back and fended off a red-hot Pepperdine team to capture their own National Invitational Tournament on Saturday at Omni Tucson National.
The Wildcats, ranked 17th nationally by Golfweek/Sagarin, finished the 54-hole event at 24-under par while the Waves finished one back after turning in a sizzling 18-under 270 in the final round to jump seven spots up the leaderboard into solo second.
Three other teams -- Arizona State (-22), Illinois (-21) and Oklahoma State (-21) -- finished within three shots of the lead.
Arizona's Zach Pollo and USC's Jackson Rivera shared medalist honors at 13-under 203 while Pepperdine's William Mouw finished three back at 10-under.
Pollo entered the final round with a one-stroke lead over Oklahoma's Matthew Troutman following a brilliant 7-under 65 in his second round on Friday while Rivera was just one off the pace.
A shaky inward nine dropped Troutman off the pace, leaving Pollo and Rivera to decide the individual title.
Rivera took a one-shot lead with a birdie on 15 but fell back into a tie with Pollo after making a bogey on the par-4, 469-yard finishing hole.
Pepperdine simply ran out of holes. The Waves began the day 14-strokes off the lead but Mouw (66), Sam Choi (67), Luke Gifford (68) and Roberto Nieves (69) all caught fire at the same time to lead a furious comeback which ended up falling one stroke short.
ABOUT THE National Invitational Collegiate
54 hole men's college tournament hosted by the
University of Arizona. Team (best four scores of five
players each day) and individual competitions.
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