USF Men’s Golf Wins Third Straight American Conference Championship

At this rate, USF really is going to become known as “The Country Club School.” And I don’t know about you, but I’m totally fine with that.

The USF men’s golf team clinched its third straight American Athletic Conference Championship title on Tuesday afternoon at Innisbrook Resort’s most challenging course, Copperhead. These Bulls joined both the men’s and women’s tennis teams in winning American Conference Championships this week.

USF entered Tuesday’s final round with a nine-stroke lead, and finished it with a 15-shot edge to claim the title.

“This one is a little different, I feel like the first couple years we had the best team. This year I thought we were battling everyone else. I wasn’t sure what to expect, to be quite honest with you,” said USF head coach Steve Bradley.

For Bradley, that’s three years at the helm and three conference championships. Pretty impressive.

Out of the nine teams in the tournament, USF led the way with 181 total pars and a par-4 scoring average of 4.16. The Bulls tied for first with 37 team birdies.

Bulls junior Jimmy Jones collected a team-high 11 total birdies and finished tied for third with an even-par score. Fellow junior Cristian DiMarco finished with nine himself. DiMarco finished the tournament at -1 and went to a sudden-death playoff for the league individual championship, where he was beaten by Houston’s Michael Perras

“Another ring is always nice. Our group of guys, we kind of underplayed ourselves all year. We knew we were capable of this and I think all of us were confident we were going to get it done this week. The new guys, Jimmy and Pri, they really just came in and carried their own weight. Jimmy had a chance to win and I’m proud of them,” said DiMarco.

USF will now await the NCAA Selection Show next Thursday evening, May 4, to see which regional they will be headed to.