Eagles venture to Sunshine State for NCAA South/Southeast Regional
For the second straight season and the sixth time since 2016, No. 20 Carson-Newman heads to the NCAA South/Southeast Regional Tournament scheduled for tomorrow through Saturday in Davie, Fla.
JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – For the second straight season and the sixth time since 2016, No. 20 Carson-Newman heads to the NCAA South/Southeast Regional Tournament scheduled for tomorrow through Saturday in Davie, Fla.
The Eagles will compete with 19 other teams made up of both the South and Southeast regions. 14 of the 20 teams that will compete this week are ranked inside the final Bushnell/Golfweek Coaches Poll.
The site of this year's South/Southeast Regional is Grande Oaks Golf Club. The private 18-hole golf course is a par 71 that measures 6,680 yards. The course was designed and has been recently renovated by the legendary golfer Raymond Floyd.
"The practice round is going to be critical for everybody," Carson-Newman head coach Randy Wylie said. "Fortunately, Maeve Cummins played there in the Women's NCAA Tournament last year, so we have had boots on the ground so to speak and we'll definitely talk to her about it. But, from what I understand it's like most Florida courses. It's going to be Bermuda. Bermuda greens, it's going to be tight and fairly flat. There will be a lot of water and sand. It will be a ball placement golf course and I feel like we play that type of course really well."
Last season, the Eagles finished in eleventh place, seven strokes away from qualifying for the NCAA Championship round. Jonathan Nielson was C-N's top finisher going 1-under over the course of the three rounds, finishing tied for 20th.
The Eagles best finish at the regional tournament as a team came in 2019, when the group finished in 8th place. Carson-Newman has never qualified for the NCAA Division II Championship as a team.
Teeing it up for the Eagles at the conference championships will be Hayden Hunneke (Chattanooga, Tenn.), Jake Mynatt (Knoxville, Tenn.), Luke Stock (Oxted, England), Elliot MacGregor (Shepperton, Middlesex) and Antonio Farinella (Knoxville, Tenn.) Mynatt is the only Eagle competitor that has previously competed at the NCAA South/Southeast Regional Tournament, having done so in 2019 and 2022.
No. 20 Carson-Newman's best team performance of the season came at the 2023 Bobby Nichols Intercollegiate. C-N ran away with the championship putting together the third consecutive best team round of the event. It becomes the first team in Bobby Nichols Intercollegiate history to win back-to-back championships. C-N beat at the time, No. 5 North Georgia by 20 strokes.
In his first and only season with C-N, Hunneke certainly made his mark with the program. The first-team all-conference selection had 19 of his 27 rounds this season be par or better, the most in program history. Hunneke's current 71.4 scoring average is best mark in program history and third lowest for a single season.
Mynatt was also a All-SAC First-Team selection. His 5th season was his best season with the Eagles. He had a career low 71.6 scoring average in 24 rounds this season. Mynatt shot a career-best 66 in the final round of the Citrus Intercollegiate to end the fall season. The graduate student also had a career best six top 20 finishes. His 118 rounds played are most in program history.
Stock also earned his first career All-SAC honor, a second-team selection. Stock had a very productive season, recording nine under par rounds. In every first round this spring, Stock has shot under par. The junior's top finish came at the Bobby Nichols Intercollegiate, where he earned fifth place after going 3-under for the tournament. His best tournament score was a 4-under effort in the final regular season event, the Tennessee River Rumble. Stock's low round came during the second round of the Irish Creek Invitational, a 4-under 67.
At a minimum, the top three teams and the top two student-athletes not with a team from each regional will advance to the finals. The remaining eight team berths will be allocated based on the regions represented in the prior year's head-to-head medal play portion of the championships. The maximum number of teams from a region is capped at seven.
Live scoring for the South/Southeast Regional Tournament is available at this link:
https://results.golfstat.com/public/leaderboards/gsnav.cfm?pg=teamPlayer&tid=27761
