NC State men’s golf season ended as redshirt junior Nick Mathews competed in the NCAA Championship in Carlsbad, California. Mathews competed individually and finished in a tie for 15th, scoring 1-over par. His 15th-place finish is the best in program history since Matt Hill won the individual title in 2009.
Georgia Tech’s Hiroshi Tai took home the individual title with a score of 3-under par, just four strokes ahead of Mathews. Tai had the best single round of the tournament, shooting a 5-under par round on the opening day, while Mathews had the second-best round with a 4-under par on day three.
What makes Mathews’ top-15 finish even more impressive is that he recovered from a poor first two rounds. On day one, Mathews shot 1-over par; the next day, he shot 5-over par to put him in a tie for 54th. Nothing went right for the redshirt junior on day two as he didn’t record a single birdie and bogeyed five holes, with three coming on the back nine.
Starting the third day of competition in danger of missing the cut for the final day, Mathews had to play his best golf and did just that. He came out firing on the front nine, recording four birdies and just one bogey. Mathews sank two more birdies on the back nine for a 4-under par round that catapulted him 36 spots up the leaderboard.
With a 4-under round under his belt, Mathews put himself in position to compete for a title on Sunday, and it looked like he might have a chance with the way he started. He shot a par on the first hole and then eagled the second hole. After an eagle on his second hole, there was a feeling it might be Mathews’ day, but that was short-lived as he bogeyed the next two holes to put himself back at 2-over par.
Mathews recovered, shooting pars on the following four holes and closing out the front nine with a birdie. He went on to birdie the 11th hole and bogey the 16th to shoot 1-under on the day for a top-15 finish at the NCAA Championship.
The Mebane, North Carolina native might’ve had a chance to win the individual title if he had taken better advantage of par 3s. Over four rounds, Mathews shot 3-over on such holes, but only two competitors in the field shot under par on par 3s, so he wasn’t the only one struggling.
He played his best on par 5s, shooting 3-under over four days. Mathews also recorded 12 birdies for the tournament, only four less than the leader, and was one of 19 players to record an eagle out of a field of 155 golfers.
With a top-15 finish in the NCAA Championship, Mathews has much momentum going into next season. This time next year, he hopes to compete again for an individual championship and a team championship, as NC State didn’t qualify this year.
