• The KillerFrogs

TCU Golf 2021-2022

JogginFrog

Active Member
Aaron Hickman (TCU '03) had another strong summer of play on the mid-amateur circuit.

This week, he tied for second in the Texas Mid-Am Championship at Houston Oaks and was co-winner of the mid-master (40-and-up) division.

Finishing in the top 5 earns him an automatic invitation into next summer's Texas Amateur Championship, which will be held at his home club in Tyler (where he won the 2020 Mid-Am Match Play).

He also made a good run at defending his Mid-Am Match Play title, reaching the semi-finals at Trinity Forest in July before bowing out to a TF member.

And in August, he finished T2 in the Texas Four Ball at Horseshoe Bay, with partner Rob Couture.

Nice playing!
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Given how hard Maridoe is, I mused earlier that Justin Gums' 66 today (2 shots better than the next-best score in a 75-man field) might be one of the Frogs' best-ever rounds in terms of strokes gained against the field average.

In the spirit of lowered home-office productivity, I ran the numbers on the four best TCU rounds of the past 5 years (all 64s), plus Julien Brun's 64 at nationals in 2013, and compared them to Gums' round today.

_SG __ Player__Score__Field ____ Event___________
9.52 __ Mazzoli___64___73.52_____ 2019 NCAA Regional
9.29 __ Gums ____ 66___75.29_____ 2021 Maridoe
8.42 __ Ravetto __64___72.42_____ 2019 Lake Charles
8.22 __ Springer__64___72.22_____ 2019 Big 12
7.00 __ Celli______ 64___71.00_____ 2021 Thunderbird Collegiate
6.96 __ Brun______64___70.96_____ 2013 NCAA Finals

Gums' round was surpassed only by Stefano Mazzoli's 64 at regionals in 2019. (That round was even better if you leave in a couple of outlier 90s that were 3+ shots worse than the next-worst score.)

So, today's round wasn't the best TCU round in history relative to the field, but it was quite a bit better, relative to the field, than four of the 64s posted in recent years.

TCU's single-round record in competition is 63, by James Sacheck in a dual match with Arizona in 2009, on a par-70 course.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Two Horned Frogs in the top 10 heading into the final round of the Euro Challenge Tour's Hopps Open de Provence. Julien Brun made 5 birdies on his last 7 holes to get to -14, which has him tied for second, four shots back of the leader. David Ravetto is T8, another four shots back.

Plus, they're spending the week in the south of France. Pont Royal is a Seve Ballesteros design.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Brun shoots even in round 4 in Provence and finishes solo 7th. Ravetto also shoots even and finishes T15.

Brun is 6th on the Order of Merit; Ravetto is 61st. Five tournaments are left in the season. David will need a win to move into the top 20 and advance to the European Tour; this week's winner moved from 70th to 23rd.

Speaking of the main Euro Tour, Johannes Veerman finished T6 this week at the Dutch Open.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU men wrapped up a pre-qualifier for the Colonial Collegiate Invitational in two weeks. Judging from the scorecards, they played Rockwood, Waterchase and Ridglea South.

I'd bet that no more than 2 slots were awarded. Jacob Oleson and Justin Gums finished first and second at -12 and -10. Five others finished between -5 and -7, and I would guess that they (and maybe Brent Hamm, who finished -2) will get a crack at the other slots within the next week at Colonial its ownself.

Pleasant surprise to see Thomas Allkins among those who broke par in all three rounds. It seems a long time since he led the Frogs in scoring average and finish percentage, and having him healthy and contributing will be a good thing.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women get their second start of the season on Sunday and Monday at the Schooner Fall Classic at Belmar GC in Norman. The TCU lineup on Golfstat is listed as:
  • Iqbal
  • Pacheco
  • Macnab
  • Jordaan
  • Lau
  • King (playing as an individual)
This event was the season kickoff last year, and was one of TCU's best results, as the Frogs finished T2 behind Baylor and ahead of both OSU and Texas. Iqbal and Lau both finished T12, and Jennie Park was T6.

As with last week, the Frogs had their best round in that tournament in the afternoon of a 36-hole day (and their worst round that morning). Will be interesting to see if TCU can start strong. I'm not sure what kind of advance play or walkthrough the women get. (I suspect not much--maybe a briefing from assistant coach Kaelin?) In this case, three players return from last year's lineup and will remember the course.)

The field of 15 teams includes three teams from last year's final top 15 (Oklahoma State, Florida State and Baylor), so it will be a good measuring stick.

Good to see Trinity King getting to compete.

Scoring: http://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=team&tid=24073
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Makenzie Niblett, who transferred to TCU in July, is no longer listed on the Horned Frogs' roster.

If she's no longer on the team, it's sad to see. Makenzie was highly ranked coming out of high school (55th among all juniors and one of just four 2020 grads to earn AJGA Junior All-America honors). She was runner-up in the Texas Women's Amateur a year ago.

Clearly things didn't work out for her as a freshman at A&M; their team fared poorly last year (coach was fired) and Makenzie didn't get much playing time.

The other top three 2020 AJGA honoree grads all became regular starters as freshmen with sub-74 scoring averages on top-30 teams. That suggested a high ceiling for Makenzie.

She was featured in a tweet by the team as recently as Sept. 9. Wish her well at TCU or wherever she ends up.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Frogs were 6th after the morning round and 6th after the p.m. round yesterday in Norman. TCU started slow -- +10 through 5 holes (+4 among counters) and finished slow (+8 on their last 6 holes), with a long middle stretch of even-par golf.

They are in a big group of 7 teams within 10 shots of each other for second-through-eighth place, so TCU is in a good position to chase down everyone in the final round but Oklahoma State, which is running away with the tournament for the second straight week, 18 shots ahead of the field. But it's good to see the Frogs in the mix with #7 Baylor and #12 Florida State.

Strength of the lineup was again Iqbal and Macnab, who are both T13 at +1. Great to see Iqbal back in form. Pacheco was also good again until a late triple.

Trinity King, playing as an individual, was +3 through 2 holes and then proceeded to shoot -4 on the rest of her morning round for TCU's only sub-70 score of the day. Great to see her making progress.

Edit: By the way, Iqbal was paired with Jennie Park yesterday and beat her by 3 over 36 holes.
 
Last edited:

JogginFrog

Active Member
One challenge of bringing in transfers is that it takes them some time to learn Colonial. Jan Schneider and Brent Hamm shot +9 and +8 over two trips around the course this week, which puts their starting spots for the Colonial Collegiate Invitational in jeopardy. With 1 round of qualifying to go, Laussot, Frimodt and Berzina look most likely to join Gums and Oleson in the lineup. Allkins has an outside shot.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
TCU women finish 6th in Norman. When they played the par-3 eighth in a collective +9 today, all that was left was to try not to fall too far down the leaderboard. They managed to do that by playing the back nine in -1 to hold off OU by a shot.

I'm guessing the Frogs may be working on one-shotters in practice this week. The team finished dead last in the field in par-3 scoring at +24; next-worst was +17.

Sabrina Iqbal picks up her second top-5 finish in a row, shooting a final-round 69 to finish Even for the tournament. Through 2 tournaments, her average score is 69.0. That is some quality golf.

Caitlyn Macnab finished T21, just missing out on a second top 20 in a field of 81.

All players contributed at least two counting scores, and Trinity King's score would have counted in all 3 rounds, so the Frogs have some balance. They'll be off for 3 weeks before the Jim West Challenge in San Marcos.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Qualifying for the Colonial Collegiate Invitational wrapped up today. I'm not sure what to make of the scores.

If you were making the decision on whom to play, which of the following players would you favor?

+1 total over 4 rounds, but +5 over 2 rounds on the tournament course
+7 total over 4 rounds, but Even par over 2 rounds on the tournament course

I guess it comes down to whether you believe in "horses for courses." We'll see what the coaches think when the lineup comes out.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
I asked yesterday which of 2 players to choose as the last qualifier. The answer that arrived in the tournament lineup announcement was "neither of the above." Instead of Player A (Thomas Allkins) or Player B (Chris Berzina), coaches went with Player C (Jan Schneider), who was:

+6 total over 4 rounds, and +9 over 2 rounds on the tournament course.

That's an unexpected choice. Schneider has a lot of tournament experience, but he's been a disaster at Colonial since his arrival, shooting 77 there in the Carmel Cup qualifier and 74-75 this week.

Allkins hasn't been much better there (78-72-73), but Fort Worth native Berzina has been consistently good at Colonial (70-68-72). Coaches are likely docking Chris for his awful performance at Maridoe (+23), but Colonial plays nothing like Maridoe, and when the tournament is at one of your home courses, I don't see how you go with a guy who has been 16 shots worse on that course over 54 holes.

Other Frogs in the lineup include Gums, Oleson, Frimodt & Laussot. They will face stiff competition this week, with a field that includes 9 of the pre-season top 25 teams and 9 of the top 14 players in the PGA Tour University rankings.

Monday's play will include 36 holes with an 8:30 shotgun start. Event is open to the public and free, so take advantage of a great opportunity to support the Frogs and see some future pros.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
When Paul Barjon gets it going, he really gets it going.

At Sanderson Farms, he had 5 birdies in a 6-hole stretch yesterday and 6 birdies in a 7-hole stretch today. And they were totally different holes.

He must be putting aggressively, because he also had three 3-putts yesterday. But when you hit over 90% of greens in reg, you're doing something right.

He's T6 on the leaderboard while somehow only -1 on par 5s.

Just one video so far on pgatour.com:
https://www.pgatour.com/video/2021/...-on-no--13-in-round-1-at-sanderson-farms.html
 

flyfishingfrog

Active Member
Qualifying for the Colonial Collegiate Invitational wrapped up today. I'm not sure what to make of the scores.

If you were making the decision on whom to play, which of the following players would you favor?

+1 total over 4 rounds, but +5 over 2 rounds on the tournament course
+7 total over 4 rounds, but Even par over 2 rounds on the tournament course

I guess it comes down to whether you believe in "horses for courses." We'll see what the coaches think when the lineup comes out.
I would definitely go with the guy who shot even at Colonial - lots of golfers light up the Rock and spend all day at Colonial chipping out of the trees

But since Coach M does exactly the opposite of what I expect - as you said in the next post, he picked the LAST guy I would choose. You don't suddenly figure out Colonial unless that involves someone breaking your driver in half and forcing you to hit hybrids off every tee.
 

First Tee Frog

Active Member
I would definitely go with the guy who shot even at Colonial - lots of golfers light up the Rock and spend all day at Colonial chipping out of the trees

But since Coach M does exactly the opposite of what I expect - as you said in the next post, he picked the LAST guy I would choose. You don't suddenly figure out Colonial unless that involves someone breaking your driver in half and forcing you to hit hybrids off every tee.
Berzina played poorly at Shady and lost to Jan by 1 in the qualifier overall. They took top 5 guys from qualifier. Can’t argue that logic. Can argue whether or not a qualifier for a tournament at colonial should have been played entirely at colonial and not included rivercrest and shady
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
Berzina played poorly at Shady and lost to Jan by 1 in the qualifier overall. They took top 5 guys from qualifier. Can’t argue that logic. Can argue whether or not a qualifier for a tournament at colonial should have been played entirely at colonial and not included rivercrest and shady
Schneider beat Berzina by 1 but lost to Allkins by 5. (Gums didn't play the second qualifier after placing 2nd in the pre-qual and finishing top-10 at Maridoe.) Maybe something else is preventing Allkins from playing? It's been a long time since he's been in the lineup, but he placed 3rd in both pre-qual and qualifier.

And I'd definitely argue that one slot should have been reserved for low cumulative score at Colonial. Frogs are sitting the guy who had the best score at Colonial in each of 2 qualifying rounds--plus the best score there in the prior qualifier--because of a bad round at Shady. OK.

Hope Schneider plays great anyway.
 
Top