Georgia Tech golf set for NCAA Chapel Hill Regional
THE FLATS - Georgia Tech’s No. 17-ranked golf team begins its quest to advance to the NCAA Men’s Division I Golf Championship for the 34th time Monday when the Yellow Jackets compete in the NCAA Chapel Hill Regional, which begins Monday at Finley Golf Club in Chapel Hill, N.C.
A total of 81 teams and 45 individuals are competing the next three days at six different regional sites for spots in the NCAA Championship. The top five teams from each regional, as well as the top individual not on one of those teams, will advance to the finals, which will be conducted May 24-29 at the Omni LaCosta Resort and Spa in Carlsbad, Calif.
As the No. 3 seed, Tech will be paired with No. 1 North Carolina and No. 2 Alabama for Monday’s first round, starting from the No. 1 tee at 7:30 a.m. Pairings for the second and third rounds (Tuesday and Wednesday) are determined by cumulative team score, but the top three teams on the leaderboard will tee off at 7:30 a.m. each day.
Tech has made it through the NCAA regional round each of the last four years (the NCAA Championship and regionals were not conducted in 2020 due to COVID-19), and 27 times since the NCAA went to the regional qualifying format in 1989. Tech shared the regional title in 2022 in Columbus, Ohio and won the 2023 regional in Salem, S.C., by eight strokes. The Yellow Jackets are playing in an NCAA regional for the 26th straight year and for the 33rd time in the 35 years the NCAA has used a regional qualifying format for its championship.
The 13-team field includes nine teams that are listed among the top 50 teams in the Scoreboard NCAA Golf rankings. In order of seed, the field also includes East Tennessee State, Northwestern, Baylor, VCU, Loyola Marymount, Long Beach State, Clemson, Michigan State, Ball State and Howard. Ten individuals also are in the field.
The other five regional tournaments are being held at Austin, Texas (The University of Texas Golf Club), Baton Rouge, La. (University Club), Rancho Santa Fe, Calif. (The Farms Golf Club). Stanford, Calif. (Stanford Golf Course) and West Lafayette, Ind. (Birck Boilermaker Golf Course).
TEAM UPDATE – Tech has been ranked as high as No. 10 in the Scoreboard NCAA Rankings, at the start of the spring season, and currently sits No. 17 after finishing third at the Atlantic Coast Conference Championship last month in Charlotte, N.C. Tech also has posted a runner-up finish at the Watersound Invitational, fourth-place finishes at the RE Lamkin Invitational, Linger Longer Invitational and the Calusa Cup, a fifth-place at The Goodwin and sixth-place at the Amer Ari Intercollegiate this spring.
Three of the five starters who teed it up for Tech in last year’s NCAA Championship are back for this edition, including ACC Player of the Year Christo Lamprecht (George, South Africa), fifth-year senior Bartley Forrester (Gainesville, Ga.) and sophomore Hiroshi Tai (Singapore). Only Forrester has played in all 11 stroke-play events for the Yellow Jackets this year. Lamprecht missed the Calusa Cup to play in the Masters, and Tai didn’t compete in the fall opener at the Olympia Fields/Fighting Illini Invitational. Head coach Bruce Heppler, who has coached Tech to 19 NCAA Championship appearances in his 29 years on The Flats, has started freshmen Kale Fontenot (Lafayatte, La.) and Carson Kim (Yorba Linda, Calif.) in six of the Jackets’ seven spring tournaments.
Lamprecht, twice a tournament winner in 2023-24, is ranked No. 6 in the Scoreboard NCAA Golf Ranking, is No. 1 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking and No. 2 in the PGA Tour University Ranking. The senior has won the Byron Nelson Award and is one of three finalists for the Ben Hogan Award as collegiate player of the year. He finished tied for third at the ACC Championship last month, while Forrester tied for eighth and Tai tied for 12th.
Forrester has three top-10 finishes this year, while Tai has two and Fontenot has one.
Lamprecht has a pair of top-10 finishes in three NCAA regional appearance in his career. In last year’s Salem (S.C.) Regional, Lamprecht tied for third place, Forrester tied for 14th and Tai tied for 18th.
TOURNAMENT INFORMATION – Eighty-one teams and 45 individuals are competing for spots in the NCAA Division I Men’s Golf Championship finals in six regional qualifying tournaments. The top five teams and one individual from each regional will advance to the finals (30 teams and six individuals total), which will be conducted May 24-29 at the Omni LaCosta Resort and Spa in Carlsbad, Calif.
Each NCAA regional is a 54-hole, stroke-play event with 13 teams and 10 individuals, or 14 teams and five individuals, competing. Tech is part of a regional field that includes 13 teams and 10 individuals. The other regional sites and their top seeds are Tennessee at Austin, Texas (The University of Texas Golf Club), Auburn at Baton Rouge, La. (University Club), Arizona State at Rancho Santa Fe, Calif. (The Farms Golf Club). Florida State at Stanford, Calif. (Stanford Golf Course) and Vanderbilt at West Lafayette, Ind. (Birck Boilermaker Golf Course).
The Chapel Hill Regional will be played at Finley Golf Club on the campus of the University of North Carolina. This will be the first collegiate men’s tournament at this location since 2021. The course was just partially re-opened to members last October after an extensive renovation by UNC alum Davis Love III and Love Golf Design. The regional will play to a par 70 over 7,084 yards.
Competition begins at 7:30 a.m. Eastern time each day of the tournament from the No. 1 and 10 tees. Pairings are set by seed for the first round, then by team score for the second and third rounds.
