No. 3 UCLA finished with a team score of 852 (-12) to edge fellow Pac-12 member Washington and Auburn by three strokes to win the U.S. Collegiate Championship at the Golf Club of Georgia in Alpharetta earlier this week.
Every UCLA player birdied the final hole and the team played the inward nine in three-under par to overtake 36-hole leader Georgia Tech for the title. The Bruins posted a final round team score of 283 (-5), the lowest of the day. Over two days, the Bruins played the final 36 holes in 12-under par.
The Bruins' team includes sophomore Patrick Cantlay (pictured top), juniors Pedro Figueiredo and Pontus Widegren and senior Alex Kim (pictured bottom). Cantlay is the No. 1-ranked amateur in the world, and winner of this year's SCGA Amateur Championship, where his teammate Kim finished T-7.
Cantlay finished tied for third with a 4-under 212 with Auburn's Blayne Barber and Michael Johnson, the UW's Cheng-Tsung Pan and Duke's Julian Suri. Figueiredo, Kim and Widegren all finished in the top 22.
USC, which led after the opening round, finished the tournament in seventh place at 871 (+7).
UCLA coach Derek Freeman was pleased with his team's effort. "Any time you win, it's an accomplishment because you feel like your hard work paid off," he said. "The guys did a great job; it was challenging and it was a battle to the very end, and I'm very proud of our performance."
With its first win of the season, UCLA now returns home for The Gifford Collegiate at CordeValle in San Martin, Calif., where they are the host. "We want to start a little winning streak now," Figueiredo said. "It's our own tournament, so it's a special event for us. We want to keep building on this win and move forward."
Cantlay knows the CordeValle course well, having won The Gifford Collegiate last year and competed in the PGA Tour's Frys.com Open there less than one month ago.
