Cover photo courtesy of Todd Drexler/SE Sports Media
California men’s golf heads to Lihue, Hawaii to compete in the 44th-annual John A. Burns Intercollegiate February 20-22.
The Bears will begin their second tournament of the spring ranked No. 28 by Golfstat which is a six spot improvement over their No. 34 ranking at the beginning of the year. Junior Finigan Tilly is ranked No. 47 by Golfweek, following a fourth place performance at the Southwestern Invitational. Cal’s top scorer shot a 213 (-3) and collected a team best, 15 birdies in the 54-hole event. Freshman Kento Yamawaki put himself on the map in the Bears’ first tournament of the spring, finishing fifth overall (214, -3) which included a second round score of 66 (-6) to match this year’s invitational’s lowest score.
California will once again compete among the nation’s best as the 21-team tournament consists of four schools in the top-15: Arizona (No. 6), Texas A&M (No. 10), North Carolina (No. 14), and BYU (No. 15). The Bears have the fifth highest ranking in the field.
The 54-hole, John A. Burns Intercollegiate will take place over three days beginning on Thursday at Wailua Golf Course in Lihue, Kauai. Each day begins with a shotgun start at 8:00 a.m. HT/10:00 a.m. PT. The par-72 course in 6,991 yards and live stats/pairings can be found here.The Bears’ lineup will look like this: 1. Finigan Tilly 2. Kento Yamawaki 3. Jamie Cheatham 4. James Song 5. Kaiwen Liu Individual: Kyle Maspat
Cal last won the tournament in 2015 which ended a five year run for the team atop the leaderboard. The last Golden Bear to claim the individual title was K.K. Limbhasut in 2016 who shared a first place finish with Texas’ Beau Hossler.
After completing the John A. Burns Intercollegiate, the Bears’ will return home to prepare for the Cabo Collegiate which will take place Sunday March 1 through Tuesday, March 3.