WVU Golf to Compete at Rutherford Intercollegiate

WVU Golf to Compete at Rutherford Intercollegiate

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (April 13, 2018) – The West Virginia golf team will close out the regular this weekend when they travel to Penn State’s Rutherford Intercollegiate, set for Saturday and Sunday at the Penn State Blue Golf Course in State College, Pennsylvania.

The Mountaineers will join the No. 42 Nittany Lions, as well as Binghamton, Cleveland State, Columbia, Eastern Michigan, Dayton, Georgetown, Loyola, Oakland, Rutgers and Seton Hall in the field. Golfers will tee off in tee times starting at 7:30 a.m. on Saturday on the par-71, 7,202-yard Blue Course. They’ll play 36 continues holes before returning at 8 a.m. Sunday for the third and final round. West Virginia is paired with Penn State and Eastern Michigan for the first two rounds, with tee times starting at 8:15 a.m.

“We are really excited to be back at Penn State,” coach Sean Covich said. “This is one of my favorite tournaments of the season. We have a few guys with some experience around this course, and the new guys will learn a lot from our assistant coach, Jay Woodward, who played here in college. It should be a fun weekend for us. I’m really looking forward to watching our guys compete in the final regular season tournament.”

The 2018 season marks the third straight year the Mountaineers have participated in the event. The squad finished as the runner-up in 2016 before taking sixth place in 2017. Junior Max Sear, who will play in the No. 1 spot, will compete in the event for the third time. Sophomore Etienne Papineau competes for the second straight year.

In addition to Sear and Papineau, freshmen Matthew Sharpstene, Mark Goetz and Logan Perkins make up the scoring squad. Senior Avery Schneider will compete as an individual.

Goetz most recently finished fourth at last weekend’s Irish Creek Collegiate, shooting 71-70-73=214 to help WVU to a sixth-place finish at the event. He sits fifth on the team with a scoring average of 74.21.

Sear continues to pace the Mountaineers with a scoring average of 72.64 with a low round of 66 on the season. Papineau (73.25) and Sharpstene (73.32) rank second and third, respectively. Sharpstene boasts the team’s lowest round of the season – and in program history – with a 64 at Martin Downs in February.

The three freshmen – Sharpstene, Goetz and Perkins – have combined for six top-20 finishes on the season thus far.

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