“Rain and severe weather hindered the University of Akron’s men’s golf team in its first tournament of the year at Council Fire Golf Club in Chattanooga, Tenn. Sept. 11 and 12. The Zips were seventh after the first day of competition but rainy conditions in the late on the second day hurt the team causing them to finish in ninth place.”
“

Rain and severe weather hindered the University of Akron’s men’s golf team in its first tournament of the year at Council Fire Golf Club in Chattanooga, Tenn. Sept. 11 and 12.

The Zips were seventh after the first day of competition but rainy conditions in the late on the second day hurt the team causing them to finish in ninth place.

The Zips finished the final round with 298 points adding to their previous scores of 283 and 288. Their final tournament score was 869.

Some of our guys stumbled coming into the final two holes due to the weather, said first-year head coach Nick Goetze.

But everyone had to deal with those conditions.

The UA men were led by freshman Drew Davidson, who tied for 26th, shooting a 3-over par, 216 in his first collegiate tournament.

Davidson will fill the leadership void left by former UA golfer Blake Statler.

We are looking for Drew to lead the way this year, Goetze said.

Junior Vaughn Snyder finished 34th with 218 strokes and was second for the Zips behind Davidson.

Vaughn returns to the links with a career strokes average of 74.55. He has been MAC Golfer of the Week three times while at UA.

We didn’t manage as well as we could have, Goetze said. We need to improve our short game, you can never be good enough at that.

The Zips entered the 2007 fall season with five new players, which Goetze says is a big recruiting class for golf.

Davidson, Trevor Fiedler, Kevin Pikus, Steve Robison and Doug Underwood make up the freshman class that joins six returning golfers from the 2006-07 team.

Snyder, sophomore Jacob Patte, junior David Addison, senior Colin Clemente, senior Matt Considine, and senior Ryan Cutowski return for the Zips this year.

Though nearly half of the Zips 2007-08 squad consists of newcomers, coach Goetze said that if the team just plays conservative and doesn’t take too many big chances, it will be a good year for the team.

We just have to play as smart as we can, he said.

The Zips will travel to Manhattan, Kansas for the Jim Colbert Intercollegiate at Colbert Hills Golf Club.

Davidson has already won the qualifier for the tournament that will be held Monday.

“