The Iowa men’s golf team begins play in its final tournament of the fall season when they tee off today at the Royal Oak Invitational in Dallas. The event is cohosted by Baylor and Southern Methodist at the par-71 Royal Oaks Country Club.

Teams will play two rounds today, and the final 18 holes will be played on Tuesday.

The No. 25 Hawkeyes will again compete with a solid field that includes eight teams ranked in Golfstat.com’s top 50: No. 14 New Mexico, No. 27 Duke, No. 28 Baylor, No. 29 Texas A&M, No. 32 Tulsa, No. 33 Oklahoma, and No. 49 Notre Dame.

Iowa head coach Mark Hankins made a slight adjustment to his lineup for the final event based on scoring average. Senior Barrett Kelpin will be Iowa’s No. 1 golfer at the Royal Oak Invitational, followed by Steven Ihm at No. 2, then Chris Brant, Ian Vandersee, and Brad George.

Kelpin, whose team-leading stroke average is 72.25, is coming off a top-10 finish at last week’s U.S. Collegiate Championship. Ihm also placed in the top 10, and Kelpin said the two will try to bring some of that momentum to Dallas.

"We have a lot of positives going into the last tournament, and I think all of that culminated together will benefit us," he said.

— by Ben Schuff