April 16, 2010

• Navy Spring Invitational History

ANNAPOLIS, Md. -- The Navy golf team will be back in action this weekend when it plays host to the 31st edition of the Navy Spring Invitational on Saturday and Sunday at the par-71 Naval Academy Golf Course in Annapolis.

Three squads will represent Navy -- Blue, Gold and White -- in the 21-team tournament, along with Bucknell, Colgate, Columbia, George Washington, Iona, Lafayette, La Salle, Lehigh, McDaniel, Millersville, Mount St. Mary's, Niagara, St. Bonaventure, Saint Francis (Pa.), Saint Joseph's, Saint Peter's, Siena and West Chester.

The tournament also provides a bit of a sneak peek at next week's Patriot League Golf Championship which will be held at Colgate in Hamilton, N.Y. Five of the seven teams competing for the 2010 conference title and an automatic bid to the NCAA Golf Regionals will be participating in the Navy Spring Invitational, while Army and Holy Cross are off this weekend.

In the 30 years the Navy Spring Invitational has been played, 17 different schools have claimed the team title. There have been 10 different winners in the last 13 years with Navy taking the team title in 2003, `06 and `08 and Johnson & Wales (Fla.) claimed crowns in 2004 and `09. There are only two previous winners among this year's field -- Navy and St. Bonaventure, who won the tournament in 2007 with a 16-over par 300 in what was shortened to an 18-hole event due to the weather.

Navy's white squad placed third among the 18 teams a year ago, while the blue team finished ninth and the gold squad was 13th. David Miller, the Mids' 2009 team captain, was the top finisher, tying for 13th with a 6-over par 148, along with then-freshman Tim Shield (Grosse Pointe Park, Mich.), who was a member of the white team.

The Midshipmen have participated in just two events this spring, opening the year with a fourth-place finish at the eight-team Johnny Palmer Invitational at the Old North State Club in Albemarle, N.C. Junior Ben Hayes (Carmichael, Calif.) led the way with a fourth-place showing after shaving eight strokes off his first-round score. He finished with a 6-over par 150. Meanwhile, sophomore Peter Reilly (Merrimack, N.H.) also scored a top-10 finish with his 9-over par 153. He, too, also was able to put together a strong second-round score, shooting par, to place eighth.

Navy competed in the Wendy's Charleston Shootout in early March, a tournament that fielded some of the strongest teams along the Eastern Seaboard. Georgia thumped the field with an 18-under 846 to win the 15-team tournament, while the Mids scored a 965 in the three-round event. Hayes and Reilly again led the way with Hayes placing 47th with an 11-over par 227, while Reilly finished 74th with a 25-over par 241.

The Navy white team will get the event started off on the first hole with its 8:15 am tee time, followed by the Navy gold squad at 9:00 am and the blue team at 9:45 am.

### Go Navy ###