SAN DIEGO – The San Diego State men's golf team continues its busy stretch this week when it participates in the Ben Cullum Invitational, Oct. 14-15, at Wood Ranch Golf Club in Simi Valley, California.
The first 36 holes of the two-day tournament will be contested on Monday, while the final round is pegged for a Tuesday completion on the par-72, 6,869-yard course layout. Both days will commence with an 8 a.m. PT shotgun start, with a live scoring link courtesy of Golfstat will be available on GoAztecs.com.
In addition to host CSUN, San Diego State will square off against Cal Poly, Grand Canyon, Sacramento State, San Diego, Southern Utah, UC Irvine, UC Riverside, UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, Utah State and Weber State in the 24th annual event, which will also feature individual golfers from such schools and Pepperdine, UCLA and USC.
For the excursion to the Greater Los Angeles region, head coach Ryan Donovan has penciled in the starting lineup of Puwit Anupansuebsai (Nakhon Phanom, Thailand), Christian Banke (Danville, Calif.), Leo Oyo (Tokyo, Japan), Callum Bruce (Banff, Scotland) and Newport Laparojkit (Montebello, Calif.), while Zihao Jin (Beijing, China) and Ambrose Abbracciamento (Newtown, Pa.) will represent the Scarlet and Black as individuals.
The Aztecs tied for seventh in their last outing at the Alister MacKenzie Invitational north of San Francisco in Fairfax, California, shooting a collective 17-under-par 835, highlighted by a trio of top-20 individual placements. Anupansuebsai tied for 12th with a 7-under 206, while Oyo landed one shot behind in the 17th position at 6-under 207, along with Laparojkit, who played as an unattached golfer. In addition, Banke tied for 29th with a 3-under 210.
For the season, Anupansuebsai leads SDSU with a 69.60 scoring average in five rounds played, while Banke (70.50), Oyo (71.13) and Bruce (72.63) are the three lone Aztecs who have started all three tournaments (eight rounds) this fall.
Next week marks San Diego State's first known appearance at the Bill Cullum Invitational, which recently changed its name in honor of CSUN's former men's golf head coach. In previous years, the event was known as the Countrywide Invitational and the Bill Cullum/Countrywide Invitational.
Cullum coached the CSUN men's team from 1965 to 1986, winning three NCAA Division II championships to go with a pair of runner-up finishes. He was named the NCAA College Division Coach of the Year in 1969 and District VIII Coach of the Year in 1970 and 1971. Under Cullum's direction, CSUN captured eight California Collegiate Athletic Association championships from 1969 to 1977. Cullum was inducted to the Golf Coaches Association of America Hall of Fame posthumously in 2012 after passing away in July of 2003.
Boise State claimed the team and individual titles at last year's tournament. The Broncos (-21) topped runner-up Cal State Fullerton (-13) by eight shots, while Brian Humphreys (-11) captured medalist honors by three strokes over UCLA's Bryan Wiyang Teoh (-8). However, new team and individual champions will be crowned this season, with Boise State skipping the event.
Following the Bill Cullum Invitational, San Diego State wraps up its fall schedule next month when it heads north to the Monterey Peninsula for the Saint Mary's Invitational, Nov. 4-6, at Poppy Hills Golf Club in Pebble Beach, California.