Feb. 17, 2011
EVANSTON, Ill. -- Fresh off its second-straight title at the Big Ten Match Play Championship last weekend, Northwestern travels to Rio Grande, Puerto Rico, Feb. 20-22, for the ever-challenging Puerto Rico Classic hosted by Purdue.
The setting for the event will be the par-72, 6,902-yard Rio Mar Country Club, where competitors will compete in 18 holes per day at the three-day event.
This perennially strong field contains four of the top-six ranked teams in the nation and all but two squads are in the current top-52 in the country according to Golfstat. The complete 15-team field is comprised of No. 2 Oklahoma State, No. 4 Alabama, No. 5 Texas, No. 6 Georgia Tech, No. 13 Georgia, No. 19 N.C. State, No. 21 Ohio State, No. 29 Michigan, No. 32 Northwestern, No. 33 Purdue, No. 39 Oklahoma, No. 45 Clemson, No. 52 Virginia Tech, No. 82 UNC-Greensboro and No. 86 East Tennessee State.
At last year's Puerto Rico Classic, Northwestern found itself in 10th place following the first round before surging on days two and three to finish in fourth place. The result was a remarkable show of team golf, because no Wildcat finished in the top 10 and only one recorded a top-20 result; when one 'Cat had a rough day, the other members picked him up to enable NU's strong finish.
For the second-consecutive year, Northwestern enters the Puerto Rico Classic flying high following a Big Ten Match Play championship. This year, NU took down Michigan, Illinois and Indiana en route to the match play crown prior to this weekend's first spring stroke play event. Junior Eric Chun (Ansung City, South Korea/International Christian School) earned Golf World and Big Ten Player of the Week awards following his efforts in helping the Wildcats take the title.
For the first time ever at this tournament, Live Scoring via Golfstat.com will be available.
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