Crimson Tide Golf Opens Season at Carpet Capital Collegiate
9/8/2011 12:00:00 AM | Men's Golf
Sept. 8, 2011
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. - Senior team captain Hunter Hamrick leads the No. 1 Alabama men's golf team back into action in the first tournament of the 2011-12 campaign. The Crimson Tide will travel to The Farm Golf Club in Rocky Face, Ga., to compete in the 23rd annual Carpet Capital Collegiate, an event in which the Tide won in 2010.
Golfweek also announced on Thursday that Alabama is the publication's preseason No. 1 team. Alabama finished the season fourth in the finals poll of 2011 and posted a 14th-place showing at the NCAA Championships.
"We are honored to have Golfweek select us as the No. 1 team in the nation," Alabama head coach Jay Seawell said. "But it is just the preseason poll, and it won't help us make a single birdie putt all season. It's a long year between now and the NCAA Championships and we have a lot of work to do, but I think it also just continues to show the hard work that these guys have put in to make Alabama golf a year in and year out national power."
Competing alongside Alabama this weekend at the Carpet Capital Collegiate are 11 other teams, including fellow SEC members Auburn, Georgia, LSU, South Carolina, and Tennessee, along with Chattanooga, Clemson, Georgia Tech, Kennesaw State, Middle Tennessee State and Wake Forest.
Six of those teams enter the event ranked in the Golf World/Nike Golf Preseason Coaches' Poll. Alabama comes in with the highest ranking, checking in at No. 3, while Georgia Tech is ranked fourth. Auburn comes in at No. 9, Georgia at No. 15, Clemson at No.16 and LSU at No.17.
The Carpet Capital Collegiate begins with the first round being played on Friday, September 9, and concludes with the final round on Sunday, September 11.
Seawell returns to the Capstone for his 10th season as the head coach of the Tide and is optimistic about the upcoming season.
"We feel like we have the talent in place," Seawell said. "The lessons we learned as a team last year, really just basically that last round of the NCAA Championships, will be something that I think will push and drive this team to be another driving force in college golf."
Leading the way for the Tide this year will be Hamrick. He will be making his 36th career start and boasts a 72.75 career scoring average. "We named him captain in the first team meeting, and I'd have nobody else lead us," Seawell said. "I look forward to watching him lead this team, and I think that's what makes a team special: when they're lead from within."
Individually, Alabama will see two new faces in the lineup. Highly touted freshman Justin Thomas will don the crimson and white for the first time at the Carpet Capital Collegiate. This summer, Thomas qualified for U.S. Amateur for the second straight year and advanced to the round of 32. He will be joined by fellow true freshman Tom Lovelady of Birmingham, Ala.
Returning for Coach Seawell and the Tide is 2010-11 first-team All-SEC and SEC Freshman of the Year, Cory Whitsett. Whitsett also qualified for the U.S. Amateur this summer and advanced to the round of 32. Whitsett returns to the Capstone as the top scorer with a 71.39 average in 11 collegiate tournaments.
Junior Scott Strohmeyer rounds out the Alabama lineup. He is entering his third season at the Capstone and has 45 collegiate rounds under his belt with a scoring average of 74.75.
Alabama will tee it up again next Friday, at the Olympia Fields/Fighting Illini Invitational at the Olympia Fields Country Club in Olympia Fields, Illinois.
Players Mentioned
