CARLSBAD, Calif. -- The University of Colorado men's golf team, with aspirations of making it into the match play portion of the 127th Annual NCAA Championship Finals, had those hopes dashed early with a slow start and a tragic four-hole stretch it couldn't recover from in finishing in a tie for 23rd place here Sunday.
Top-seeded and No. 1 Auburn surged into the lead, moving up from third with a 10-under 854 team score, as the Tigers overtook second round leader, No. 5 Arizona State (6-under 858). No. 8 Oklahoma is third (861), No. 7 Florida fourth (863, the last team under par), with No. 2 Oklahoma State and No. 4 Teas tied for fifth (5-over 869).
The top 15 made the cut for Sunday's final round, after which the top eight go into the match play portion of the championship.
The tie for 23rd matched CU's 10th-best finish in 17 appearances in the NCAA Finals.
Colorado, ranked 29th but was the 22nd seed, opened here in a tie for eighth and it looked promising that the Buffaloes could advance into the match play for the first time since it was incorporated into the format in 2009. Hoping to get out the chute early with solid play, the Buffs moved to 4-over par fairly quickly in the round, falling out of its 12th-place tie it started the day with to behind the cutline. Still in the mix around the turn (7-over), the Buffs ballooned to 17-over by having its scorers play holes 11 through 14 at 10-over. Unlike in the second round, there was no late flurry of birdies that saved the day and one of the most successful seasons in school history came to a disappointing if not a crushing end.
That end was closing with a 21-over par 309 team score, that had CU finish overall with a 32-over par 896 total, same as Nevada-Las Vegas. The Buffs were three strokes out of a top 20 finish and wound up 15 strokes behind the cut.
"Nothing much to really say other than it was a super-disappointing day," head coach said. "Just didn't have it as a team for the first time in a couple of seasons. Maybe we held on to the wheel too tight. I'm not sure. But a very hard golf course we had a tough time with.
"We knew with a good round today, we would have a chance to make match play and have the program's highest-ever NCAA finish. That's what we were truly expecting, we felt we were capable of it, but it didn't happen and is an extremely tough way to finish one of the greatest seasons in our history. But we need to celebrate our incredible seniors and our returning players need to use today as a lesson to improve."
Junior wrapped things here with CU's best score in the final round - a 1-over 73 on the 7,480-yard, par-72 North Course at the Omni La Costa Resort & Spa -- which tied him for 77th with an 8-over 224; he rebounded from an opening 78 with a pair of 73's. He was the only Buffalo on Saturday to not have at least one hole worse than bogey, as he had tied for the team-high with three birdies with 11 pars against four birdies. His nine birdies over the weekend were a team-best, to with 32 pars and playing the par-5's the best of all the CU duffers at 3-under.
Senior , who had one of Saturday's best scores in the afternoon (an even-par 72), couldn't match that magic on Indy 500 day, as he turned in a 7-over 79, also for an 8-over 224 and a tie for 77th. He was 1-under through seven and still even after 10, but a run of four bogeys over the next five holes and a triple on 18 to close things out did the damage to his scorecard. He did have three birdies with seven pars opposite seven bogeys and the triple, and had eight birdies and 33 pars overall. He played the par-5 holes the best at 1-over, and was just 3-over on the par-4's.
Sophomore finished with a 4-over 76, tying him for 87th with a 9-over 225 total. He had a team-high 15 pars on Saturday, with two bogeys and a double. He was just 1-over on both the par-3's and par-4's (2-over on the par-5's); he played the 3's and 5's the best over the event at 2-over on each.
Senior , who had opened with a bogey-free 68 and was tied for fourth after the first round, struggled to match that success and finished with a 10-over 82, giving him a 10-over 226 total and a tie for 96th. He was just 1-over through 10 (one birdie, two bogeys, seven pars), but a stretch over the next seven holes included two bogeys, two doubles and a triple roughed up his scorecard. To his credit after all that, he gathered himself to finish with a par. He led the Buffs with 37 pars overall, with six birdies opposite seven bogeys, three doubles and the triple. He joined Knight in playing the par-3's the best by a Buff at 2-over.
Sometimes timing just isn't on someone's side - both McDermott and Biwer recorded their highest scores of the year on Sunday - and for Biwer - just his third in the 80's in 151 career rounds (McDermott had just two in 146 career rounds). The two still exit their careers as CU's all-time leaders in stroke average, Biwer at 70.95 and McDermott at 71.10, both blowing by the old mark of 71.68.
"Though Justin and Dylan finished their careers on a disappointing note, in no way should it diminish their outstanding careers at Colorado," Edwards said. "They established themselves from the beginning as talented freshmen who only got better, had many tremendous, successful moments, and both put a full-out assault on many of our records. They will both go down as two of the greatest players - and young men - in our program's history."
Sophomore tied for 148th after closing with a 9-over 81, which gave him a final score of 24-over 240. He was never able to get untracked, though he did finish up with six straight pars. But he triple-bogeyed the par-5 2nd hole and when he bogeyed the par-3 3rd, he was 4-over pretty fast and was trying to get back on track. He scored his lone birdie on the 427-yard, par-5 5th hole and otherwise had 11 pars and played the par-4's at 1-over on the day. For the weekend, he had five birdies, 30 pars opposite 11 bogeys, six doubles and two triples while playing the par-3's at 7-over, the par-4's at 8-over and the par-5's at 9-over.
Mississippi's Michael La Sasso took over the individual lead, carding a 2-under 70 and building a two-stroke lead with an 11-under 205. Texas A&M's Phichaksn Maichon is alone in second after shooting the low score in the second round, a 4-under 68, and is at 9-under 207.
The top eight teams after the final round on Monday will advance to the match play portion of the championship. Georgia Tech and Wake Forest will have an early playoff to determine the 15th place team.
NOTES: The Buffaloes teed off at 8:20 a.m. local time under mostly cloudy skies and a temperature of 63 degrees, though not getting much warmer, mostly sunny skies prevailed by the end of the round but the wind hovered between 5-10 miles per hour ... The biggest break of the day was afforded Brigham Young - because its athletes can't participate in sporting events on Sundays, when it qualifies for the NCAA's, they played the Sunday round after the practice round on Thursday - and shot a 1-over 289, which logged in as the fourth-best score for the round ... The average score for all 468 rounds so far is 74.61; it was 74.25 on Friday, 74.78 Saturday and 74.80 Sunday ... The differences between the morning and afternoon rounds all three days was fairly significant: Friday (74.78, 73.72), Saturday (73.24, 76.31) and Sunday (75.54, 74.06). There are just 17 players under par (down from 38 after the first round and 24 after the second) and only 5 others who are even ... There were just five scores in the 60's Sunday (one 68, four 69's) ... The eight toughest holes overall through 54 holes in order remained Nos. 14, 12, 3, 7, 8, 16, 13 and 17; the 517-yard, par-4 14th also remained by far the toughest (+0.55): the four Buffs who scored for the team each day, however, played it tied for the best in the field at just 2-over (10 pars, two bogeys) with Auburn and Texas ... Colorado played the par-3's at 23-over (tied for 24th-best; Arizona State is first, playing them at 7-over), the par-4's at 27-over (tied for 19th, Auburn leads at 6-under, the only team subpar) and the par-5's at 9-over (tied for 27th; Oklahoma the best at 17-under) ... The Buffs tied for 24th in birdies (34; Florida and Texas Tech had 54), were fifth in pars (168; Auburn had 179), had the fifth-fewest bogeys (47; Auburn had 37, New Mexico the most with 67); and wound up with the fourth-most holes of bogey or worse (21; San Diego had the high with 25, Arizona State the fewest with three) ... The Buffaloes finished 179-50-3, a .782 winning percentage against Division I competition (27-16 vs. Big 12 foes); the 179 wins will either lead the nation or finish behind Auburn, depending on where the Tigers finish Sunday.