The Valparaiso University men's golf team began the three-day, 54-hole Peoples Golf Championship – hosted by Western Carolina at the par-71, 6664-yard Sea Palms Resort in St. Simons Island, Ga. – on Thursday. Junior Adam Melliere (Zionsville, Ind. / Zionsville) led the team in Thursday's opening round.
 
How It Happened

• Melliere golfed a 2-under 69 to put himself in a tie for 15^th in the 123-player field. He carded par or better on 17 of the 18 holes and dropped in birdies on Holes 6, 9 and 12, two par 3s and a par 4.
• Three Beacons stroked par or better on Thursday, including sophomore Rob Politza (Lemont, Ill. / Lemont Township) with a personal-best 70 (-1). He is tied for 21^st on the player leaderboard. He had three birdies to counteract two bogeys.
• Redshirt junior Ryan Somerville (Aurora, Ontario / Aurora) played even par with a 71, tied for 35^th on the leaderboard. Somerville had three birdies – including two on consecutive holes on 16 and 17 – to offset three bogeys.
• As a team, Valpo posted a 285 (+1) on the opening day of competition, tied for 10^th of 21 participating teams. Western Carolina and Belmont are tied for the top spot at 277 (-7), while Gavin Isbell (Samford) and Theo Takman (Charleston Southern) share individual leadership at 66 (-5).

Thoughts from Head Coach Dave Gring
"Today's opening round was our best ball-striking round of the spring season, thus far. The team hit 71 percent of our fairways and 72 percent of our greens, so the guys managed the golf course very well. We had two different battles with rain and wind for a couple holes during the round, and the guys played well during both of those weather interruptions. This was also one of our best putting rounds of the spring season. We still missed almost two dozen putts from 3' - 10'.  Tomorrow we need to improve both our speed and green reading on these Bermuda-grass greens, and we can improve our scoring even more."
 
"Adam was very solid for us again today from tee to green. He was 8/13 in hitting fairways and 16/18 in hitting greens.  He made birdie on two of the three Par 3s on the front nine and he only had one bogey on the scorecard. Rob had his best round of the spring season. He hit 9/13 fairways and 14/18 greens in regulation. Rob shot -3 on the back nine, so he finished the round really well. Ryan had another solid ball-striking day, hitting 11/13 fairways and 13/18 greens in regulation. He finished his round with birdies on two out of the last three holes and he made birdie on two of the five Par 3s."
 
Up Next
The Beacons will play Round 2 of the Peoples Golf Championship at Sea Palms Resort in St. Simons Island, Ga. on Friday. A link to live scoring via LeaderboardKing is available on ValpoAthletics.com.