N.C. State runs away with CCU’s Hackler Championship; individual title determined late
North Carolina State made the team competition somewhat anticlimactic on Tuesday at the VI Sports General Hackler Championship at The Dunes Golf and Beach Club.
But the individual title came down to the final two holes, with defending champion Zack Taylor of host Coastal Carolina in the mix.
N.C. State, one of five teams in the tournament ranked in Golfstat’s top 50 at No. 32, took a 10-shot lead into the final round and won by eight shots over runner-up No. 28 North Florida at 12-under 852, despite a 7-over 295 Tuesday in windy conditions.
Coastal finished fifth in the 16-team field, also behind No. 47 Louisville and No. 8 North Carolina.
Taylor birdied holes 15 and 16 to reach 8 under and pull within a shot of the lead in his bid to become the Hackler’s first repeat champion, and Louisville’s John Murphy sandwiched birdies on holes 16 and 18 around a bogey on the 17th to reach 9 under.
But North Florida freshman Nick Gabrelcik, who was playing in the final group, birdied the last two holes to claim a two-shot win at 11-under 205.
The freshman phenom
Gabrelcik has made quite a splash in collegiate golf.
In five events thus far, he has four top-four finishes, including a pair of wins.
“I knew I had what it takes to have this sort of start, because at a young age I’ve played with older people and I’ve played in a lot of amateur events with college kids so I’ve grown to get used to playing with them, so they’re not like intimidating or anything,” Gabrelcik said. “But this good of a start? Probably not what I envisioned. I’m glad it happened but it’s definitely unexpected.”
He bogeyed the 13th hole to fall to 9-under and checked the leaderboard on his phone after the 15th hole. He wasn’t interested in making pars coming in to share the individual title.
“I knew I needed to birdie one of the last three,” Gabrelcik said. “Me and my coach (Scott Schroeder) talked about it and decided to go at pins and go for the win.”
He established himself as the Ospreys’ No. 1 player before the season and entered the week ranked 13th in Golfstat’s individual college rankings.
The resident of Trinity, Florida was the Florida State Golf Association Junior Player of the Year in 2019 and largely played close to home, participating in just a few out-of-state tournaments. His one American Junior Golf Association event was held in Florida.
But he has quickly acclimated to golf road trips.
“My whole game plan is to play as aggressive as I can,” said Gabrelcik, whose instructor is Kyaw Htet at Innisbrook Golf Resort. “I look at it as you make more birdies the closer you hit it to the hole, so why not aim at the pin more often than not. It’s worked so far, hopefully it keeps working out.
“I know how to manage my golf ball in tough conditions, which really helped this week. . . . The greens were receptive enough in the wind where I knew with longer irons I could still hold the green and get close to the pin, so that definitely helped me inside know that I can trust it. Other than that the greens were smooth and rolled true to your line so I knew I could make putts.”
Taylor gives valiant defense
In Tuesday’s final round, Taylor made birdies on the first and ninth holes to make the turn 2-under for the day and pull within a shot of the lead at 8 under for the tournament.
He fell back with bogeys on holes 11 and 12, but made birdies on 15 and 16 to secure a third-place finish at 8-under 208, which matches his winning score from 2020.
“This is our home event. It’s definitely an honor to play for Coastal and play for our community, so coming to defend that is really cool,” Taylor said. “It might put a little extra pressure on but if you want to be good you have to be able to perform under that pressure.”
Taylor shot a 71 in the opening round with four birdies and moved up the leaderboard with a 5-under 67 in the second round that included eagles on the fourth and 15th holes and birdies on the first, fifth and 10th holes to go along with a pair of bogeys.
He eagled the 529-yard fourth, where he made a double bogey in the first round, with a 7-iron from 190 yards to 7 feet and the 540-yard 15th with a chip-in from 30 yards. “I was just happy to get a really solid round of golf going,” Taylor said.
On March 6, Taylor qualified for the first half of the 2021 season on the Mackenzie Tour – PGA Tour Canada by finishing third at the second Mackenzie Tour Qualifying Tournament at Mission Inn Club and Resort in Florida at 11-under 277.
He wasn’t particularly excited about his game entering the qualifier.
“I tried to take as much pressure off myself and realize like it’s not a life or death situation, just try to have more fun with it,” he said. “I was getting way too upset, way too angry and annoyed if I wasn’t hitting it exactly how I wanted to. So I took a step back and looked at it as at the end of the day it’s a game.
“. . . But it’s a game that I really like so I might as well go and try to enjoy it.”
Taylor now has the relief of knowing where he will be playing professionally once the CCU season is over, as long as border restrictions put in place by the Canadian government because of the coronavirus are repealed.
The Mackenzie Tour is one of three international PGA Tour-sanctioned tours along with PGA Tour China and PGA Tour Latinoamérica. They are subsidiaries of the Korn Ferry Tour, which is the PGA Tour’s feeder circuit.
“It takes so much pressure off,” Taylor said. “That’s why I was so stressed. Like, I want to play golf more than anything and didn’t have a place to play it yet, and now that I do, even if it’s only for a guaranteed six weeks it’s a job for now, it’s a place to play and I just have to keep taking it one step at a time.”
N.C. State realizes expectations
ACC teams didn’t play in the fall, and N.C. State has finished in the top five of its four spring events thus far, including third on March 2 in the Wake Forest Invitational at Pinehurst No. 2.
“We’ve kind of been waiting for this. We know we have a really good team and we just kind of hadn’t quite put it together yet this spring. But our confidence has been growing quietly,” Wolfpack coach Press McPhaul said. “They just did a really good job of going out there and doing their job, playing their game, being confident in their preparation and who they are as players, and letting it go and cutting it loose, it was just really fun to see.”
All five Wolfpack players finished in the top 25.
Sophomore Maximilian Steinlechner of Austria finished fourth at 6-under 210 after holding the 36-hole lead, grad student Christian Salzer of Sumter finished seventh at 214, senior Easton Paxton tied for 11th at even-par 216, sophomore Carter Graf tied for 17th at 218, and grad student Benjamin Shipp tied for 25th at 220.
Shipp, a three-time college champion, tied for second in last year’s Hackler.
“We’ve just been kind of trying to keep doing our job and wait for something good to happen,” McPhaul said. “The game doesn’t always reward you immediately. It rewards diligent, patient work over time. We’ve just had to sort of hang in there and wait for something good to happen, and if feels like it’s maybe starting to turn this week.”
Steinlechner, who returned to Austria over the winter break and therefore had to knock some rust off this spring, was coming off a tie for second at Pinehurst No. 2 on March 2.
He made just one bogey through the first 36 holes at the 7,233-yard Dunes Club to take a two-shot lead over Gabrelcik into the final round. But he made seven Tuesday including four straight on holes 12-15 before a closing birdie for a 76.
“I feel like I lost a little bit of my game in the first year when I came here, but I’m slowly starting to get it back and get better than I was before,” said Steinlechner, who won the 2017 Austrian Junior, Austrian men’s stroke play and Austrian men’s match play titles, and finished third in the 2019 European Amateur.
“I feel like I’ve definitely made some improvements and definitely gotten more consistent, and I’m starting to taste the fruit of my work.”
Coastal secures solid finish
Coastal finished ahead of 11 teams in a field that included eight ranked in the top 60 in the country by GolfStat. CCU began the week ranked 94th.
The Chants were in second at 2-under overall as a team near the turn Tuesday but fell back by playing The Dunes Club’s back nine 13-over as a team, including a combined 6-over on the par-3 12th and par-5 13th holes with a pair of double bogeys.
“We hit a bit of a rough stretch. Holes 12 and 13 I think were tough holes today and we didn’t execute,” CCU head coach Jim Garren said.
In addition to Zack Taylor, fellow grad student States Fort, who has a win this spring, shot a 73 Tuesday to tie for 25th at 4-over 292, sophomore Seth Taylor of Gaffney shot 76 to tie for 29th at 5 over, junior Brady Hinkle of Lancaster shot 79 to tie for 49th at 5 over, and junior Connor Newton of Auburn, Alabama shot 76 to tie for 77th at 17 over.
Each has played in at least three of CCU’s six tournaments this season.
It’s Coastal’s fourth top-five finish this season, including a win, but the first against a strong field. In CCU’s other events that included several of the nation’s top teams, CCU finished last in a 12-team field at the Maridoe Collegiate Invitational in October in Texas, and 19th in the 21-team Florida Gators Invitational last month.
“We had a good week,” Garren said. “We’ve had some top fives this year but we didn’t really have any quality wins or top-fives against good fields and we finally got one, so that’s certainly encouraging. Zack and States continue to lead us but we’ve seen really good things at times this week. Another solid week by Seth and Brady showed some good signs, so I like where we’re at.”
Coastal had six other team members playing as individuals this week, and sophomore Jorgen Viken of Norway was the top performer among them with a final-round 73 and tie for 29th at 5-over 293.
“This is the deepest team since I got here, so it’s going to be hard to make the lineup,” Garren said. “You get outside of maybe your top three every year and it’s kind of a crap shoot. But there’s no second-guessing.”
CCU has a quick turnaround for its next event at East Carolina next Monday and Tuesday – one of three remaining events before the Sun Belt Championship at Mystic Creek Golf Club in El Dorado, Arkansas.
“We’re competing every week. Whoever is playing well is going to play,” Garren said. “I think everybody on this team is capable of playing at a high enough level. We’re getting to the time of year when postseason is a month away, you’re looking for guys to step up. It would be nice if somebody would come in and secure a couple spots.
“At the same time there are probably only one or two spots that are firmly secure. If you’re playing well you should never feel like you don’t have a chance to play. . . . We want them all ready to go.”
This story was originally published March 16, 2021 at 9:19 PM.
