Last time out, the Cardinals started the MEC portion of their spring schedule, competing with the Women's team at the Charleston Invitational. As a team, the Cardinals placed two golfers in the top 20 of the event and as a team they placed sixth out of the 10 teams in attendance. The Cardinals would get two rounds of competition in on day one, and started things strong in round one. They shot 307 as a team through the first 18 holes, and it was enough to get them into the top five of the event, sitting 5th after round one. The team score would end up raising by 11 strokes in round two, sitting at 318, as the Cardinals would drop out of the top five. They finished sixth overall at the event, and had a two-day team score of 625, their lowest two rounds score since the team shot 564 over two rounds of the Dr. Wally Edgell Invitational back on September 18th & 19th, 2024.
 

Leading the way for the Cardinals was freshman Robin Duzmann, who was the picture of consistency throughout the day. Duzmann had a strong start, shooting a 76 in round one, finishing +5 for the first 18 holes. As he moved into the second round of competition, Duzmann continued his consistency on the course. He dropped his round one score by one stroke, shooting a 75, and brought his two-day score to 151 as he continued his strong spring season. It was Duzmann's highest individual finish in his collegiate career, taking 14th in the event. It was the second time during the 2023-2024 season that Duzmann finished in the top 30 of an event and he looks to keep his consistency going as he heads into the spring conference schedule.
 

The lowest single round score of the event would come from freshman Phillip Halvorsen, who shot just one over Par in the first round. He put together a 72 and found himself in the top 10 of the event, sitting in a tie for seventh after 18 holes. However, in the second round, Halvorsen would shoot an 81 to bring his two-round score to 153 as he took 16th overall in the event. He finished five strokes under his season average in round one and four strokes above his season average in the second round. Rounding out the top three for the Cardinals was MJ Darmawan, who finished 36th with a combined two-round score of 161. Darmawan was the Cardinal's leader in the first event of the spring and looks to continue his growth through the spring.
 

With two more tournaments left during the spring season for the Cardinals, they are looking to round out a season of growth. With an all-freshman team competing in the spring, the Cardinals have had a chance to rebuild the program from the ground up this season. They have already made history during the spring, with the first ever MEC Men's Golfer of the Week award being won a few weeks ago by Darmawan. They look to keep making history over their final two tournaments of the year and will get to do so on their home course. Each of their final two tournaments will come at the Oglebay Country Club, where the Cardinals do their practices. The home environment plus the young talent looks to continue to move the program in right direction.
 

Course Details
 

The MEC spring invitational will be played at the Oglebay Country Club on their Palmer Course. It is the newest of the courses at Oglebay, with a par 71, offering several challenges for its players. The course features three challenging par 5's while the rest of the holes sit at either a par three or par four. With it being the course the Cardinals practice on, they have some familiarity with the course and look to use that to their advantage.
 

The Details
 

The first round action for the MEC Spring Invitational is scheduled for Monday with tee times starting at 9 AM. Follow along with wucardinals.com for updates throughout the day.