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VOLS OPEN FALL SLATE
Carpet Capital Collegiate Begins Friday in North Georgia
Tennessee head coach Jim
Kelson figures if Augusta National makes for a perfect start to
professional golf’s major calendar, it only makes sense his Vols open
their season each year with the collegiate version of the same caliber.
The
Carpet Capital Collegiate opens Friday for the first of three rounds at
The Farm in Rocky Face, Ga., 30 miles south of Chattanooga.
“It’s
always one of the highlights of our season,” Kelson said. “Basically,
that’s kind of The Masters of collegiate golf. It’s got a great field,
it’s a great golf course, the greens are always super-slick and they
just do a tremendous job.
“It’s always a thrill for us to go down there and play, and we’re really looking forward to getting our season cranked up.”
Starting Five
Kelson’s
opening-weekend lineup features five familiar faces – seniors Garrick
Porteous and Darren Renwick, junior Jay Vandeventer, and sophomores
Danny Keddie and Marshall Talkington. The only newcomer to UT’s
eight-player roster this year is Rick Lamb, a junior transfer from
Santa Clara.
“We’re really excited about this
year’s team,” Kelson said. “We’ve got a good nucleus of players coming
back. We’ve got some guys who have stepped up and really had some good
summers and have shown they can compete at an extraordinary high level.
“We’re
looking forward to mixing in a couple of the other guys and seeing what
they can do. Hopefully, this will be a great weekend for us and we can
start strong.”
Porteous likes the challenge of The Farm, which plays to Par 72 at 7,012 yards.
“The
greens will be running fast,” Porteous said. “It’s quite a demanding
course. It’s not a long course, but they always tuck the pins away.
Having good distance control is the key this week.
“It’s
a really good field, this tournament, and it’s probably our biggest one
of the fall. It’s a good way to start off the season.”
Vols Receiving Votes
Tennessee
opens its four-tournament fall slate receiving votes and positioned
just outside the top 25 of the Golf World/Nike Golf Division I College
Preseason Coaches’ Poll. Tennessee finished 24th last season at the
NCAA Championships for their third straight top-25 national showing.
Joining
the Vols at this year’s Carpet Capital are six ranked teams – No. 3
Alabama, No. 4 Georgia Tech, No. 9 Auburn, No. 15 Georgia, No. 16
Clemson and No. 17 LSU – and three others receiving votes – Kennesaw
State, South Carolina and Wake Forest. Chattanooga and Middle Tennessee
round out the 12-team lineup.
Only South Carolina did not make the 2011 NCAA tournament field.
Kelson,
who is beginning his 14th season as Vols head coach, says he teams
always seem to appreciate the challenging competition.
“We’ve
had some success there and we’ve had some times when we haven’t played
our best,” he said. “It’s a very difficult and challenging course – and
field. We just need to bring our best game to be able to compete in
this tournament.”
The Vols begin play Friday at 9
a.m. on the No. 1 tee alongside LSU and Auburn. Weather conditions look
ideal, with mostly sunny skies each day and highs near 80 degrees. Live
scoring is available on UTSports.com via Golfstat.com.
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