Last weekend, the Colgate men’s golf team took a short trip down to Ithaca, New York to participate in the Cornell Invitational. The Raiders looked to build on the momentum they gained during the first two tournaments of the year when they placed first at the Colgate Invitational and sixth at the Bucknell Invitational. Unfortunately, faced with stiff competition from all across the region, the team stumbled to an 11th place finish.

Binghamton University won the tournament with a three-round total of 868, well ahead of second place Columbia University (881). Longwood University was edged out by Columbia but rounded out the top three with a total of 883.

Although tournament host Cornell placed a solid fifth with an overall score of 894, they were disappointed relative to the performances of the host teams in the first two tournaments. Colgate and Bucknell each placed first in their own respective invitationals.

Colgate finished with a three-round total of 937, tying Rider University for 11th place in the tournament. Despite the less than desirable finish as a team, there were several moments where individual Raiders shined on the golf course, like junior captain Ben Jessen, who led Colgate with a total score of 233. Jessen faced difficulty coming out of the gate, shooting an 83 in the first round, but it was all uphill from there. Jessen proceeded to shoot a second round 77 followed by a strong final round score of 73.

Raider sophomore Will Delano continued his impressive 2010 campaign by finishing two strokes behind Jessen with a total score of 235 (80-74-81). Fellow sophomore Hunter Hanson rounded out the top three finishers for Colgate, shooting consistently throughout the weekend (81-78-80) to finish with a final score of 239.

In the end, however, the individual efforts of the Raiders simply did not measure up to the staunch competition at the Cornell Invitational.

“There is really not an excuse – we were unable to play consistently for 54 holes and unfortunately, it was a combined struggle,” Jessen said of the team’s performance.

This weekend, the Colgate men’s golf team will travel down to Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey to take the course at the ECAC Championship.

“We all have different facets of our game that let us down this weekend,” Jessen said. “We have each identified our issues and will place the majority of our focus during practice on improving upon these for the [upcoming] ECAC’s.”