Category: Men

The Cabo Collegiate is circled heavily on the Arizona State calendar.

The tournament, now in its 10th year, introduces the Sun Devils to teams from areas outside Pac-12 country – teams they may not otherwise compete against.

“Every year we build our schedule around this event,” Arizona State head coach Matt Thurmond said. “Our guys get up for it.”

It was about this time a year ago that Arizona State began to turn around its season. The Sun Devils finished runner-up four times in their first five starts last year, but finally got over the hump in February with a three-shot win over Texas A&M at the John Burns Intercollegiate in Hawaii.

CABO COLLEGIATE: Team | Individual

Arizona State showed up in Cabo the next month to go toe-to-toe with Oklahoma State, a team that still had Matthew Wolff and Viktor Hovland in the lineup. It was like the two teams were playing another tournament. Oklahoma State won at 32 under with Arizona State second at 24 under. The next-best team was 15 shots back.

“The last two years, we had a chance to win and Oklahoma State beat us both times,” Thurmond said. “We are so excited to finally hold the trophy.”

The Cabo Collegiate is Arizona State’s third victory so far this season after winning its first two tournaments out of the gate this fall. The Sun Devils are ranked No. 9 in the Golfweek/Sagarin College Rankings.

Scenes from the first two rounds at the @CaboCollegiate 😎 #collegegolf (📸 Dino Gomez) pic.twitter.com/oACL2326yL

— Golfweek Colleges (@collegegolf) March 3, 2020

Remarkably, Arizona State counted three rounds of 68 on the final day at Cove Club at Cabo Del Sol in Cabo from David Puig, Cameron Sisk and Ryggs Johnston. Masen Andersen added the fourth counting Sun Devil score, a 1-under 70.

“That round today was beyond what I could have expected,” Thurmond said.

The Sun Devils, who were in third place through 36 holes, made an early move as Puig logged four birdies in his first six holes and Sisk was 3 under through two holes with a birdie-eagle start. Arizona State finished the week at 20 under as a team, which was eight shots better than runner-up Texas A&M.

“It was huge for our team to have a couple of hot starts,” Sisk said. “It put us in a good position for the rest of the round. I didn’t really know where we were, but I knew it was a big boost for our team and me individually.”

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ROAD TO GRAYHAWK BLOG: We are counting down to the NCAA Championships in Scottsdale, Arizona.

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Note that Arizona State competed this week without its top-ranked player. Senior Chun-An Yu, ranked No. 51 by Golfweek, is in Orlando preparing to tee it up at the Arnold Palmer Invitational as an amateur this week.

“We are missing our top player Kevin Yu and we are better with him of course,” Thurmond said. “But it was a special challenge for us. These are the guys who maybe people don’t know as much. They wanted to make sure they did their part.”

Runner-up Texas A&M climbed six places on the strength of medalist Walker Lee’s 7-under 64 and Dan Erickson’s 69. The Aggies posted a third-round 278 (6 under) and a 54-hole total of 840.

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