Big Ten Match Play Up Next For IU

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – The Indiana men's golf team will get the spring portion of the 2015-16 season underway on Friday at the Big Ten Match Play Championship. The event will take place Friday and Saturday at the Hammock Beach Resort Conservatory Course in Palm Coast, Fla.

TOURNAMENT INFORMATION
Hammock Beach Resort Conservatory Course • Palm Coast, Fla.
Par 72 • 7,183 yards
Live Scoring: BirdieFire.com

With just 10 of the 14 conference teams competing in this year's event, the format has changed. The teams will play three pre-determined teams – two on Friday and one on Saturday. Then, the final round on Saturday will match the teams with similar records in each division against each other (East #1 vs. West #1, etc.).

Indiana will take on Penn State to start things on Friday at 8:00am before battling Minnesota at 1:15pm on Friday. Then on Saturday morning, IU will play Rutgers starting at 8:00am.

PARTICIPATING TEAMS
West Division: Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue
East Division: Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State, Rutgers

INDIANA LINEUP
There will be six players competing for each team in each round, with all scores counting. Competing for the Hoosiers will be:

Brendon Doyle
Jake Brown
Max Kollin
Keegan Vea
Andrew Havill
Jack Sparrow

BIG TEN MATCH PLAY HISTORY
Here's a look at how the Hoosiers have played over the course of this event:

2014-15
2.15.15- Northwestern L,1-3
2.15.15- Penn State L,1-4
2.16.15- Michigan State L, 1-4
2.16.15- Nebraska W, 2-2

2013-14
2.14.14- Wisconsin W, 3-0
2.14.14- Northwestern L, 0-1
2.15.14- Ohio State W, 3-2
2.15.14- Minnesota T, 1-2 (Minnesota won tiebreaker)

2011-12
2.10.12- Ohio State L, 2-3
2.11.12- Iowa T, 3-4 (Iowa won tiebreaker)

2010-2011
2.11.11- Wisconsin W, 6-0
2.11.11- Iowa W, 4-2
2.12.11- Ohio State T, 4-3 (IU won tiebreaker)
2.12.11- Northwestern L, 2-4

2009-2010
2.11.10- Minnesota L, 2-3
2.12.10- Illinois, W, 4-2
2.12.10- Ohio State L, 1-5

2008-2009
2.13.09- Purdue W, 4-2
2.14.09- Michigan State W, 4-1
2.14.09- Michigan W, 3-2
*Big Ten Match Play Champions*

BROWN BRINGS IT
Redshirt freshman Jake Brown wasted little time etching his name into the IU record book when he posted a 5-under par score of 66 in his final round at the Windon Memorial.

His final round score of 5-under par 66 marked the best round by a Hoosier since David Mills carded a 66 in his second round at the NYX Hoosier Invitational on April 6, 2013. It is also the best score by an IU freshman since David Erdy registered a 65 on March 22, 2009 at the Collegiate Match Play qualifier in Rancho Santa Fe, Calif.

VEA'S 68 AT WINDON
Junior Keegan Vea set a career best in the final round of the Windon Memorial earlier this season, when he carded a 68 to help the Hoosiers to a seventh place finish as a team. At the Quail Valley Collegiate, Vea opened with a 76 but improved his score each round, including a 2-under par 70 in the final round to tie for 34^th. He followed that up with rounds of 74-71-75 at the Ka'anapali Collegiate Classic, which put him in a tie for 36^th.

DOYLE BRINGS CONSISTENCY
Sophomore Brendon Doyle has been the Hoosiers' most consistent performer through the first five tournaments of the season. His scoring average of 75.33 is third-best on the team while he has posted scores of 75 or better in nine rounds this year, which is one off the team lead.

HAVILL HAS IT IN FINAL ROUND
Indiana junior Andrew Havill did not get off to the start he had hoped for in the first tournament of the year at Rich Harvest Farms, posting a score of 81 in round one. But he reversed that trend over the next two rounds, recording rounds of 75 and 71, respectively.

The his final round score of 71 was his best single round score since February of his freshman year when he posted a 68 at the Snowman Getaway in Arizona. It was also the best round of any IU golfer at the tournament.

Another strong final round for Havill came in round three of the Crooked Stick Intercollegiate, where he carded a score of 77 when the average score for the round was 79.6, as the wind picked up during the day and made scoring difficult.

NEW FACES
The true freshman class for the Hoosiers features just one player – Trevor Ranton from Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. But there are two other players that sat out last year and are redshirt freshmen this year in Jake Brown and Jack Sparrow.

Ranton joins the Hoosiers after a decorated junior career and a stellar summer season where he won the CN Future Links Pacific Championship as well as the GAO Ontario Junior Amateur after opening both of those tournaments with a score of 65 en route to the win. He also posted four other Top 25 finishes at various tournaments in Canada and Japan.

Brown, a native of Carmel, Indiana, did not compete in any events last season as a true freshman on the team, but produced outstanding results in summer tournaments leading up to the 2015-16 season with the Hoosiers. He won the Indiana Open Championship qualifier with a round of 65 at The Legends Golf Course and then went on to tie for 14^th in the Indiana Open. He continued his strong play at the US Amateur qualifier at Prairie View, finishing in a tie for eight place. Then at the Northern Amateur, he posted three rounds of 74 and tied for 29^th in that prestigious tournament.

Jack Sparrow, like Brown, did not compete for the Hoosiers as a true freshman, but produced results this past summer. The Floyds Knob, Indiana, product was third at the Indiana Amateur qualifier and then finished eighth at the Indiana Open qualifier before matching that finish in the Indiana Open with two rounds in the 60s (68, 69). He wrapped up his summer with a 10^th place finish at the Northern Amateur with scores of 72-69-75.

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Jake Brown

Brendon Doyle

Andrew Havill

Max Kollin

Trevor Ranton

Jack Sparrow

Keegan Vea