The No. 20 California men’s golf team will stay close to home this week when it competes in The Goodwin at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco. The three-day, 54-hole event, hosted annually by Stanford at the site of the 2020 PGA Championship, runs Thursday through Saturday.
The Golden Bears will play the first and second rounds alongside the three other top-ranked squads in the 31-team field, No. 8 Tennessee, No. 15 Georgia Tech and No. 22 Georgia. Ten teams competing at The Goodwin are ranked among the top 50 nationally (Clippd).
Cal tees off hole 1 between 1-1:48 p.m. PT Thursday and starts the second round on hole 10 between 8:05-8:53 a.m. PT Friday.
TOURNAMENT INFO
- Dates: March 28-30, 2024
- Format: 54 holes (18-18-18, Thursday-Saturday); 5-count-4
- Location: San Francisco, California | TPC Harding Park
- Course Info: Par 70 | 7,193 Yards
- Live Scoring: Golfstat
THE FIELD (31)
Appalachian State, #45 BYU, #20 California, California Baptist, Cal Poly, Clemson, Colorado, #22 Georgia, #15 Georgia Tech, Howard, Lipscomb, Little Rock, #49 Long Beach State, Nevada, #24 Oregon, Oregon State, Pepperdine, San Diego, #31 San Diego State, San Francisco, San Jose State, Santa Clara, #44 Stanford, TCU, #8 Tennessee, UC Davis, #27 UCLA, USC, Utah, Utah Tech, Washington State
OFF THE TEE
1. Sampson Zheng
2. Ethan Fang
3. Kuangyu (Tony) Chen
4. Eric Lee
5. Daniel Heo
Individual: Jeewon Park
CHIP SHOTS
- Cal owns an 82-26-1 record with six top-five finishes and a pair of victories in eight stroke-play events this season. The two victories came back-to-back in October at the Alister MacKenzie Invitational and the Cal Poly Invitational.
- Cal most recently carded a tournament-low 10-under-par 274 in the third round to climb four spots and finish in fifth place at the Pauma Valley Invitational on March 19.
- The Bears have ranked as high as No. 17 this spring and have held a national ranking for all 10 weeks of the spring season.
- Freshman Ethan Fang has been on a tear this spring, earning three top-10 finishes in four tournaments. He most recently tied for second at the Pauma Valley Invitational, shooting 70-70-65 (-8). He’s averaging 70.50 strokes per round across 12 rounds played this spring.
- Sampson Zheng has excelled at The Goodwin the past two seasons, tying for third in 2022 and fifth in 2023. He’s 15-under-par across the two most recent editions of the tournament, shooting 66-66-67 in 2022 and 69-73-64 in 2023.
- Zheng, Cal’s No. 1 this week, has played in just five stroke-play events for Cal this season, owns a scoring average of 70.86. He’s ranked 22nd in the latest PGA Tour University poll and 60th nationally (Clippd).
- Kuangyu (Tony) Chen, ranked 86th nationally (Clippd), has played in all eight of Cal’s stroke-play events this season, owning a 70.58 scoring average across 24 rounds. Chen ended the fall slate with a bang by winning the Cal Poly Invitational (206, -10) and tied for third at the John Burns Intercollegiate (209, -7) in February.
- Eric Lee – who won his collegiate debut at the Marquette Intercollegiate last September – and Daniel Heo both tied for 37th individually at the Pauma Valley Invitational. Lee has competed in seven of Cal’s eight events as a freshman (twice as an individual) while Heo is making his second appearance in the Bears’ lineup this spring.
- Three Bears – Chen, Lee and Zheng – earned Pac-12 Golfer of the Week honors in the fall. All three are competing this week.
- Jeewon Park, playing as an individual, tees off at 9 a.m. Thursday (hole 1) and Friday (hole 10).