THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1999

Men's golf places second

By Manuel Gamiz, Jr.

On-Line Forty-Niner

The Long Beach State men's golf team kicked off its spring season in impressive fashion, finishing in a tie for second out of 12 teams at the Cal State Bakersfield Roadrunner Classic Tuesday at Seven Oaks Country Club in Bakersfield.

Although the 49ers did have a good outing, they were no match for the host team, who finished in first place with an even-par 586. CSUB also had three of the top five finishers in the tournament.

"The only team that beat us was the team that plays at the course four or five times a week," Head Coach Bob Livingstone said.

The 49ers ended the two-day tournament with a score of 15-over-par 601, but Livingstone said he believes the team could have scored higher.

"Our scores were pretty good considering how bad we putted," he said.

Cal State San Bernardino was the other second place team. Cal State San Marcos and Point Loma rounded out the Top 5, finishing 17 and 19 strokes behind respectively.

After two rounds of golf, sophomore Brian Merrick led LBSU with a 5-over-par 149 to finish in a tie for sixth place. The next highest finisher on the team was sophomore John Mallinger, who finished with a 6-over-par 150, which placed him in a tie for 11th place.

Rounding out the LBSU golfers were senior Stephen Yanagisawa and junior Steve Mena, who both ended the tournament with 8-over-par 152 scores to finish in a tie for 19th place. Sophomore Kevin Wurtz finished in a tie for 33rd with a 10-over-par 154 score.

LBSU will have a month off before they tee off again. On March 4-5, the team travels to Goleta to compete in the Pacific Coast Intercollegiate, which will be hosted by UC Santa Barbara.

"We are going to sit back and evaluate this performance," Livingstone said. "In between, we will have some inter-squad tournaments before heading to Santa Barbara."