BEAUMONT, Texas – The Lamar University men's golf team opens its spring season by competing at the All-American Intercollegiate that gets underway Friday at the Golf Club of Houston in Humble, Texas.
 
The Cardinals have been idle since wrapping up their fall season on Oct. 30, when they finished sixth at the Steelwood Intercollegiate. In four fall events, the Cardinals won one team title, capturing the OGIO Utah Invitational in early October, and claimed three individual titles, as Zander Gous won two events and Mans Berglund earned medalist honors in another.
 
The 18-team field will play one round each day on the par-72, 7,096-yard layout. Competition is scheduled to start at 9 a.m. Friday and Saturday and at 8 a.m. Sunday. LU is one of five Southland Conference schools in the field, joining Houston Baptist, McNeese, Sam Houston State and Southeastern Louisiana. Other teams competing are co-hosts Houston and Rice along with Auburn, Baylor, Charlotte, Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State, Samford, SMU, South Carolina, UTSA Vanderbilt and Wisconsin.
 
"We are excited to get the spring season underway," LU coach Jessie Mudd said. "We are starting off with a very good field and a fantastic golf course. We will make a good plan and stick to it, and hopefully at the end will be up at the top of the leaderboard."
 
Berglund led the Cardinals in the fall with an average of 70.45 strokes per round over 11 rounds. He posted three top-five finishes and finished in the top 10 in all four autumn events. Gous, who averaged 71.36 strokes round, had LU's lowest of the fall, an 8-under-par 64 at the Jim Rivers Intercollegiate en route to winning medalist honors.
 
Gous was the Southland Conference Golfer of the Month in September, while Berglund received that accolade for October.
 
Other top scorers for LU in the fall were Cody Banach (73.50), Charlie Flowers (75.80), Eason Wang (75.82), Clay McCrory (76.00) and Conor Rodrigues (79.00).
 
THE COURSE: The Golf Club of Houston is the site for the Shell Houston Open. It is one of only 11 public courses to host a PGA event.
 
WEATHER FORECAST: Friday could see isolated thunderstorms with a 30 percent chance of precipitation, with a high of 69 and winds out of the southeast at 10 mph. Saturday will be partly cloudy with a high of 81 and only a 10 percent chance of rain. Winds will be out of the south at 8 mph. Sunday's round will be played under mostly cloudy skies with winds out of the southeast at 19 mph. The high will be 77. There is a 20 percent chance of rain.
 
UP NEXT: The Cardinals will compete at the Border Olympics, set for March 10-11 in Laredo, Texas.