A furious Duke rally — that the University of North Florida nearly matched — pushed the Blue Devils ahead of the Ospreys for the final NCAA championship qualifying spot on Wednesday at the Norman, Okla., regional.
Trailing UNF by three shots with both teams yet to play Nos. 8 and 9 to finish their rounds at the University of Oklahoma Jimmie Austin Golf Club, Duke players Luke Sample, William Love and Ethan Evans combined for six birdies on the last two holes, while UNF’s players shot 4-under, with Duke clinching fifth place at 21-under par.
The Blue Devils finished seven shots behind regional champion Alabama, but it was good enough to reach the NCAA championship May 26-31 at the Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. The top-five teams in six regionals make up the 30-team field at Grayhawk.
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UNF finished at 20-under after its five players negotiated the last two holes with five birdies and one bogey. Robbie Higgins birdied both holes and Nick Gabrelcik, Lance Yates and Cody Carroll each birdied No. 8 and parried the last.
It came down to Duke’s Kelly Chinn and UNF’s Davis Lee, a Ponte Vedra High graduate. Chinn parred No. 9 and Lee bogeyed, missing a 12-foot par attempt.
Lee missed the green left and pitched over a greenside bunker. He finished with a 72 and a tie for 12th at 6-under 210. Gabrelcik (68) also tied for 12th, Higgins (67) tied for 16th, Yates (71) tied for 36th and Carroll (73) tied for 53rd.
Ludvig Aberg of Texas Tech (67) was the individual winner at 14-under 202.
“It was a pretty good shot to get it on the green,” said UNF coach Scott Schroeder of Lee, who had rounds of 69-69 on the first two days. “Davis played well all week. He got off to a good start [with birdies on his first two holes] hit some rough spots, and battled back.”
Had Lee made the final par attempt, UNF would have gone to a playoff with Duke for the NCAA berth. It would have been UNF’s second appearance in a row at the NCAA Championship and fourth in six years.
“We’ve come up short in these [regionals] in the past because we played poorly but that wasn’t the case today,” Schroeder said. “We had a few three-putts in the middle of the round that came back to bite us but we played pretty well. Duke’s guys just played better on the last two holes. It still hurts to come that close.”
The Ospreys, who played in their 13th NCAA tournament under Schroeder, will return a strong nucleus for next season in Gabrelcik — a three-time All-ASUN player of the year — Lee, Higgins and Yates.
Alabama had three of the top-11 players, led by Nick Dunlap (70) in a tie for fourth at 7-under. Drew Goodman (67) and Ben Lorenz (66) of Oklahoma were second and third but the Sooner didn’t have another player among the top-20 and they finished three shots behind the Tide.
Colorado (23-under) was third and Texas Tech (22-under) was fourth.
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: UNF golf team comes up one shot short of reaching NCAA championship