UCLA men’s golf to play exhibition game against USC
By Brandon Dupre
March 3, 2014 12:58 a.m.
Although a game may be scheduled as an exhibition, whenever the opponents are wearing Trojan red and putting USC-emblazoned head-covers back over their drivers and into red-trimmed golf bags after a drive on a par-five – that game matters.
UCLA men’s golf plays Monday at The Valley Club in Santa Barbara in an exhibition game against rival USC.
The match comes 12 days after the Bruins finished third at The Prestige at PGA West.
“Our last tournament was a week and a half ago, so this is like a little warm-up to make sure we aren’t rusty for the weekend tournament,” said sophomore Lorens Chan.
The Monday match against the Trojans is scheduled to allow the players a tune-up round before they head to Las Vegas to play in the Collegiate Masters.
Rather than using standard round scoring, the tournament will be match-play format, making for a head-to-head atmosphere with each Bruin playing against the Trojan walking down the fairway next to him.
“We don’t play match-play too often. Golf is kind of hard to have a rivalry match so I think this is our way of doing it,” Chan said. “The overall rivalry is pretty big, so this is our way of expressing it. We don’t get to do it too often because we are constantly playing in tournaments against multiple teams, so having a one-on-one is pretty big for us. It’s kinda about who runs LA.”
The match may be listed as an exhibition game and not count toward NCAA rankings, but it will feel like a rivalry game.
“We want to be the golf powerhouse in LA and that begins with beating them tomorrow,” said sophomore Jonathan Garrick.
Compiled by Brandon Dupre, Bruin Sports contributor
