Men's Golf | August 27

DeKALB, IL – The Northern Illinois University men's golf team opens its 2026-27 this Saturday and Sunday at the Virtues Intercollegiate, hosted by Miami at Virtues Golf Club in Nashport, Ohio.
 
The Huskies return seven of the eight student-athletes from last season's team that rallied for a second-place finish at NIU's final Mid-American Conference Championship. With its first season in the Horizon League ahead, NIU and head coach John Carlson look forward to the new challenges ahead for the year.
 
"With the move to the new league, we'll continue to play a national schedule," said Carlson, who is entering his eighth season at the helm of the Huskies. "This weekend we'll face four teams from the Horizon League and we'll see more as we work through the year. The national ranking system with Scoreboard will let us know where we stand throughout the season. Time will tell but we return everyone from last season and I like where we're at."
 
Five different Huskies were NIU's top finisher in the 2025-26 season. Senior Craig Long (Alpharetta, Ga./Milton) won Wisconsin's Badger Invitational last September, using a bogey-free final round 65 to win the tournament at -11. He was an All-MAC Second Team selection last season with a scoring average of 73.182, posting 14 rounds of ever par or lower.
 
Junior Conner McCall (Vandalia, Ill./Vandalia) was the Huskies' leader in scoring average for the 2025-26 season at 73.091, an improvement of almost two strokes per round from his first season at NIU. Like Long, McCall also had 14 rounds of even par or better last year. He posted a career-best 18-hole score of 67 in the final round of the Lake Las Vegas Invitational to tie for sixth place. McCall earned MAC Golfer of the Week honors for his career-best finish.
 
"We're all coming off good summers," said McCall. "We finished last season strong  and that showed we all have the ability and we can compete against anybody."
 
Fellow juniors Patrick Raupp (Arlington Heights, Ill./Prospect), Jack Mulligan (Burr Ridge, Ill./Hinsdale Central) and Beau Petersen (Gretna, Neb./Gretna) all also lowered their scoring averages from their freshman campaigns. Raupp tied for fifth at the MAC Championship and finished under par in two other tournaments. Petersen was NIU's top finisher in two events last year, finishing at even par at Georgia Southern's Schenkel Invitational. Mulligan posted a top-20 finish at the Jim DeLapa Collegiate with an even par score of 210, which included a career-low round of 66 in the second round.
 
"They all want to leave a mark at NIU and they want to do it together," Carlson said. "They've gotten experience being in the final pairings, now it's about getting over that hump and winning events both individually and as a team. Everyone knows how important it is to avoid double bogeys and chip and putt at the highest level they can. Both Patrick and Conner have made big strides in their short game and that'll go a long way in determining how well they play this year."
 
"We can't wait to go out and compete," Raupp added. "The energy from the team is super high. Being in the new conference gives us an opportunity to put the NIU name on a trophy we haven't been on yet."
 
The Huskies' schedule this season is not just national, but international as well. Following this weekend's tournament NIU will head to Muskoka, Ontario to play in the Canadian Collegiate hosted by Kent State Sept. 13-15. The following week the Huskies will play in Duke's Rod Meyers Invitational, the first of three tournaments NIU will play in hosted by programs that reached the NCAA Championship stroke play last season. On March 15-16 the Huskies will play in the Tiger Invitational hosted by the defending national champions Auburn. The Huskies will also head to the west coast twice this spring for tournaments in Hawai'i and California.
 
"Recruits and their parents and families certainly made mention to how well we schedule," said Carlson. "We may be in the Horizon League but our schedule doesn't look all that different than a Big Ten program. We've earned the right and opportunity to go out and play against the highest level of competition. The tournaments at Duke and Auburn are just two of five or six events where we'll face a majority of the top 75 teams in the country."
 
The Huskies bolstered this year's team with the addition of two freshmen. Caden Petersen comes to NIU from Benet Academy, where he tied for fifth individually at the IHSA Class 3A State Championship. He won the East Suburban Catholic Championship and broke Benet's single-round scoring record with a seven-under par 65 at Hinsdale Central. He was the #1 ranked player in Illinois by Rolex AJGA and Junior Golf Scoreboard. Finley Gastrau is most recent European to join the Huskies, hailing from St. Gallen, Switzerland. In 2025 Gastrau was the medalist at the USGA Junior Amateur at The Oaks Golf Course in Cottage Grove, Wis., winning by five strokes with an eight-under par 63. He also won the WPGA Junior Tour Championship.
 
"Caden is a very mature player that has won at the junior level," Carlson added. "When his family moved back to Illinois, we got into his recruiting process late and that led him to our program. He also works with the TPS Group which has brought us players like Jordan Less, Zach Place and current players like Patrick Raupp and Jack Mulligan. Finley has played a majority of his junior golf in Wisconsin the last two years. We were able to watch him at US Junior events and he's been one of the top junior golfers in Wisconsin, even though he's from Switzerland."
Starting on Saturday, NIU has 11 tournaments to get ready for its first Horizon League Championship April 24-26 at Mission Inn in Howey-in-the-Hills, Fla. Coach Carlson and his Huskies are ready for this new chapter in NIU Men's Golf.
 
"I'm proud of our continuity, culture and leadership within the program. They've embraced the two new guys coming in this year. Academically we've had the highest team grade point average among the men's programs here at NIU. Their focus and attention is on being the best student-athlete possible. They want to achieve on the golf course as much as they have in the classroom."
 
--NIU--