Feb. 7, 2013
After a sub-par first round Wednesday from Hawaii, Sun Devil men's golf got back into form Thursday, as they completed the second round of the Amer Ari Invitational from Walkoloa Kings' Course.
Arizona State shot a combined six-under par 282, fourth best among the 20 participating schools. They started the day tied for 12th and head into Friday's final 18 holes at three-under par and in 10th-place, one shot back of 13th-ranked Stanford.
No. 7 ranked Washington leads all schools at 21-under par, and only UCLA is close, trailing by two strokes. The top five schools to this point all rank in the top 10 in the nation, and eight of the nine schools ahead of ASU to this point rank in the top 25. TCU is the lone unranked among that group, and is tied for sixth.
For the Sun Devils, freshman Max Rottluff reemerged after finishing third in the last tournament, as he shot a five-under par round of 67 to place himself tied for 11th heading into tomorrow's final round after being tied for 51st coming into the second round. He's at four-under par. Rottluff had an eagle on the fourth hole to go along with five birdies. He trails the leaders, Cody Gribble of Texas and Pontus Widegren of UCLA, by three strokes.
A pair of ASU golfers, Jon Rahm Rodriguez and Mathias Schjoelberg, is tied for 30th, but with opposite stories for the day. Rahm Rodriguez shot a two-under par round of 70 and climbed the leader board from 51st, where he was tied with Rottluff starting the day. Schjoelberg went the other way on the leader board, as he shot one-over par and fell from 14th-place. Both are one-under par through the first 36 holes.
Friday's final round will be a shotgun 7:30 a.m. (PT) start and will go until a champion is crowned. Live scoring of the Amer Ari Invitational will be available throughout the final round at golfstat.com.