The UConn men’s golf team has had the ideal season up to this point, winning numerous competitions, including the UConn Invitational at GreatHorse, Big East Match Play and the Surf Club Invitational. The Huskies have also added numerous top five finishes to their resume and are looking for revenge in this year’s Big East Championship.
For Connecticut to win its first in-conference championship in three years, the program will need a short recap of how last season ended. In the Huskies’ previous campaign, the program performed well throughout the regular season, although they couldn’t put the pieces together at the Riverton Pointe Golf and Country Club, finishing ninth in a field of 10. However, this shouldn’t deter Connecticut fans from believing the team can flip the script.
UConn fans should look out for Jimmy Paradise to lead the program. The senior Florida native was a key player all last season, and that hasn’t changed just because the calendar has. Paradise has consistently finished atop the leaderboard for Connecticut this year. He is also coming off an excellent performance, finishing in the top 10 of the competitive Rutherford Invitational, where the rest of the program failed to get going as they had hoped.
Another player who could give the rest of the field trouble is Tommy Dallahan, who has been nothing short of excellent as well. The Simsbury native also put together a top-10 performance in the program’s last appearance. How the two seniors get out of the gates will play a significant role in whether the program leaves the Palmetto State victorious.
The other athletes’ performances will also play a deciding role. Luckily, for UConn fans, no golfer has had a true “poor outing” in recent memory, and all of them tend to finish within a couple of strokes of each other. If the program wishes to succeed in this outing, it will need that same consistency when it treks to South Carolina.
This year’s tournament will take place on the same course as last year’s, meaning that the coaches will be able to plan for anything abnormal that the golfers need to look out for, not to mention individual strategies to attack each hole. As good as UConn was last season, they have taken it to a different level this season, and fans should expect a strong performance from Connecticut. The action will commence from April 27 to April 29.