Anteaters Getting Chance to Play Through

A sampling of the UC Irvine golf team:

One player comes from France. One from Taiwan. One didn’t take up the sport until he got smacked in the face with a baseball.

Irvine, for only the second time since the school joined Division I, has been selected to play in the NCAA West Regional. The Anteaters are one of 18 teams in the 54-hole tournament, which will be May 13-16 at the Karsten Golf Course in Tucson. The top nine teams from each regional advance to the NCAA championships May 27-30 in Albuquerque.

“I do believe this is a good thing,” deadpanned Coach Jeff Johnston.

“In my mind, it’s tougher to make the regionals than nationals.”

There is a lot that could be said about Johnston’s mind.

He once joked about the liking fog on a particular course because, “I can sneak out there and move my team’s balls closer.” He also has two master’s degrees, one in sports and ethics, which shows he would never follow through on such a fantasy.

Johnston is correct, though, about how difficult it is to reach the regional. Any selection committee is likely to consider reputation in its criteria. Considering the Anteaters beat out Stanford for a spot in the regional, the committee looked at the whole picture this time.

“I believe David got one over Goliath here,” Johnston said. “Politics definitely enters into this. When you think about Stanford, you’re talking about a little guy named Tiger Woods and the national championship team they had there. But the committee went with facts.”

It didn’t take Joe Friday to reach a conclusion. Irvine finished ahead of Stanford five times in seven tournaments this season.

The Anteaters aren’t blessed with a star-quality player and Johnston has reached far and away to get players.

Jerome Valentin is from France.

“Hey, he’s a Frenchman, they can smell the good programs over there,” Johnston said.

Andrew Wen started playing golf in Taiwan, then his family moved to San Diego just to play golf. He does so despite back pains from an automobile accident four years ago.

Mike Lawrence didn’t play the sport until he gave up baseball at age 10. He was warming up a pitcher without a mask and took a ball on the nose, sending him to the hospital.

They are the Anteaters’ three most consistent players.

Lawrence, a junior, finished second in the Big West Championships last week. He has finished in the top 10 in three tournaments. Wen, another junior, also has had three top-10 finishes.

They, and others put Irvine in a regional for the first time since 1982, when the Anteaters finished eighth and reached the national tournament.

“To make the regionals, you have to play consistent all year long,” Johnston said. “Making the nationals, all you need is to get hot and play three rounds well. We don’t have any outstanding team performances, but in every tournament, whether we were on or off, we kept it together and placed consistently. The committee saw that.”

Notes

Women’s basketball players Leticia Oseguera and Sabrina Roberson made the first cut at the WNBA Sparks’ tryout last weekend. There will be one more cut before the training camp roster is set. . . . The women’s sailing team won the Pacific Coast championships last week. Irvine and Stanford finished tied, but the Anteaters won the tiebreaker by having more first-place finishes in the 22 races. Fiona McLean and Simrun Kalra won the Division A competition. Irvine will compete in the national championships May 25-27 in New Orleans. . . . The Irvine women’s crew won the Collins Cup on Sunday at the Newport Regatta with a time of 7:50.2 in the Varsity 8 race. The men’s team finished third in the Varsity 4 and sixth in the Varsity 8.