Florida Men’s Golf Advances To NCAA Championship

The Florida Gators men’s golf team will get a chance to defend its national title when it qualified Wednesday for next week’s NCAA Championship with a third-place finish at the West Lafayette (Ind.) Regional.

See you in Cali, Gator Nation 🐊

The defending National Champions are headed back to the NCAA Championship 🏆#GoGators pic.twitter.com/hhsZs7lKWF

— Gators Golf (@GatorsGolf) May 15, 2024

Florida, which has made the championship in 20 of the last 22 tournaments, was in fourth after Monday’s first round, dropped a spot to fifth after Tuesday’s round before picking up the pace to finish third at Kampen-Cosler Course. UF finished 4-under 860.

Top-seeded Vanderbilt won the regional with a three-round score of 24-under 840, followed by Purdue, Florida, Arizona and New Mexico to advance.

Graduate student William Moll became the first Commodore to win an individual title at an NCAA regional, as he finished in first place after carding 7-under 209.

Florida top-25 finishers were Parker Bell (T8, 4-under 212), Jack Turner (T18, 1-under 215) and Ian Gilligan (T23, 1-over 217). Turner led the Gators with a final round 3-under 69.

🎟️👊

Next stop, La Costa ⛳️#GoGators pic.twitter.com/yRBf3Jt47s

— Gators Golf (@GatorsGolf) May 15, 2024

The NCAA Division I Men’s Golf Championship is slated for May 24-29 at Omni La Costa Resort & Spa in Carlsbad, California, where the Gators will go after their sixth national title.

Also competing: Auburn, LSU, Texas A&M, Tennessee, Virginia, Texas Tech, Ohio State, Clemson, East Tennessee State, North Carolina, Georgia Tech, Baylor, Oklahoma, California, Oklahoma State, West Virginia, North Florida, Illinois, Florida State,  SMU, Stanford, Texas, Notre Dame, Utah and Wake Forest.

The Gators won the NCAA team title, individual title (Fred Biondi) and SEC title in the same season for the first time in program history a year ago at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.

“It still hasn’t sunk in that we actually won and the coolest part about it is how forever it is,” UF coach J.C. Deacon said. “It will never go away, you’re national champions forever.”