Iowa men’s golf heads south for Big Ten Match Play

The Iowa men’s golf team will make its eighth appearance at the Big Ten Match Play in Palm Coast, Florida.

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Ben Allan Smith

Iowa’s Alex Schaake poses for a portrait at Hoak Family Golf Complex on Tuesday, April 24, 2018.

Jess Westendorf, Sports Reporter

The Iowa men’s golf team opens its 2019 season and spring slate at the 11th annual Big Ten Match Play in Palm Coast, Florida, on Friday and Saturday.

The Hawkeyes enter the tournament as the No. 3 seed. In the first round of the tournament on Friday, Iowa will face off against No. 14 Nebraska at the Ocean Course.

This tournament will be formatted so that teams can have an eight-player tournament roster with six players competing in each match.

Scoring will be determined and listed as a win, loss, or tie.

A match win will be worth one point, while a halved match will be worth a half point for the teams. After the three-round matches, teams will be ranked 1-7 in their division and face teams from the opposing division with the same ranking on Saturday.

Iowa enters the tournament ranked No. 47 and will be joined by 13 other teams, including No. 27 Illinois, No. 36 Northwestern, Michigan, Minnesota, Indiana, Michigan State, Penn State, Wisconsin, Ohio State, Rutgers, Maryland, Purdue, and Nebraska.

The lineup for the Hawkeyes will consist of seniors Matthew Walker and Aaron DeNucci, juniors Alex Schaake and Benton Weinberg, sophomore Jake Rowe, and freshman Gonzalo Lean Montero.

This will be the eighth time that the Hawkeyes will be competing at the Big Ten Match play. In the past seven appearances, Iowa has earned top-10 finishes with five of those appearances being in the top five.

The Hawkeyes will look to kick off the spring slate on a high note and top their finish last season in 2018, where they posted a 2-2 record to finish in ninth place.

The tournament will conclude on Saturday after the final 18 holes are finished and scored.