Men's Golf | October 19

VERO BEACH, Fla. – The Northern Illinois University men's golf team completed the fall portion of its schedule on Monday with the final round of the Quail Valley Collegiate Invitational, hosted by Michigan State at Quail Valley Golf Club. The Huskies finished 13^th with a team score of 14-over par.
 
The Huskies' best team score came in Monday's final round with a three-under par 285. Conner McCall (Vandalia, Ill./Vandalia) led the way with a two-under par round of 70. McCall had four birdies and an eagle on the par-five 10^th hole on Monday. Craig Long (Alpharetta, Ga./Milton) and Devin Swoyer (Hinsdale, Ill./Hinsdale Central) added a one-under par 71 with Patrick Raupp (Arlington Heights, Ill./Prospect) rounding out the scoring with a 74.
 
"It was a good finish to have three rounds under par today," said head coach John Carlson. "We are a deep team with seven players this season contributing to our team scoring."
 
McCall was NIU's top finisher in the event, tying for 11^th with a 54-hole score of three-under par 213. He started the tournament with a two-over par 74 on Sunday morning, then vaulted up the leaderboard and into the top-10 with a round of 69 in the afternoon. McCall was three-under par after 10 holes, but bogeyed the 11^th and 13^th to go back to one-under. He bounced back with consecutive birdies on 14 and 15 to get to three-under. This is second straight top-20 finish.
 
"Conner continues to get better each week in his career," Carlson said. "He was outstanding with his ball striking all week in blustery conditions."
 
Sunday morning started on a very high note when junior Jack Mulligan (Burr Ridge, Ill./Hinsdale Central) made a hole in one on his very first hole of the day. Mulligan aced the par-three second hole to start his round of 74. It's NIU's first hole in one since Joo-Young Lee had one in the second round of the 2016 Mid-American Conference Championship.
 
NIU finished 13 strokes ahead of Florida Gulf Coast who took 14^th. Minnesota won the event by five strokes over Kansas. The tournament field included six teams ranked in the top 50 of the Scoreboard national rankings.
 
"We were beaten by highly-ranked teams this week," Carlson said. "We must drive the ball consistently and improve our scrambling percentage in order to take the next steps as a program competitively this spring. This is a very hard-working team and they know what they need to work on."
 
NIU opens the spring schedule at Hawai'i's John A. Burns Intercollegiate Feb. 11-13 at the Ocean Course at Hokuala.
 
--NIU--