Central Alabama wins Stallion Invitational, ABAC 3rd

Published 3:00 pm Friday, March 4, 2022

TIFTON — Central Alabama Community College shot 289 as a team Tuesday and earned an 18-stroke victory in the Stallion Invitational at Spring Hill Country Club.

The Invitational was quite a tournament for the Trojans. They earned the best score in two of the three rounds and the 289 on Tuesday was the best any team shot during the entire tournament and only one over par. Their three-round total was 894.

Walters State Community College (Tenn.) finished 27 strokes behind first, with a total of 921. Host Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College was third at 925. Both the Stallions and Walters State had strong finishes to move up a place on the final day of competition. Wallace State (Ala.) dropped from second to fourth during the same span.

Head coach Larry Byrnes was very pleased with the performance. Competition, he said, was “really, really tough.”

Low medalist came from a different college entirely; Trey Rouse finished at an even par 216, two strokes ahead of Central Alabama’s Hayden Carner. Another Central Alabama player, Ken Goforth was third at 219 (+3).

ABAC was led by Ben Sanders and Hagen Marion, seventh and eighth individually, +9 and +10 overall. Both played well, he said. Sanders had the best round of any ABAC player, a +1 73 in Monday’s second round.

“I’ve got great kids,” said Byrnes. “They performed.”

He said that even with competition as loaded as it is — Golfstat ranks Central Alabama as the No. 2 team in NJCAA’s Division I — Stallions players told him they thought they should have finished even better.

The scores of Brock Barber and Brady Kotkiewicz also counted towards ABAC’s total. Barber finished at 233 (+17) in the tournament, Kotkiewicz at 239.