The Valparaiso University men's golf team bounced back in the second round, trimming 15 strokes off its Round-1 score, as the squad played the first 36 holes of South Alabama's Mobile Bay Intercollegiate on Monday at the par-71, 7239-yard RTJ Magnolia Grove Falls in Mobile, Ala.
 
How It Happened

• Junior Adam Melliere (Zionsville, Ind. / Zionsville) was the most consistent Beacon on Monday, carding a 73 (+2) in each round to finish the day tied for 39^th of 81 at 146.
• Melliere, who was 3-under through his first seven holes of the opening round thanks to a string of three straight birdies, eagled the par-5 18^th in Round 2.
• After Melliere led the team in Round 1, senior Owen Sander (Carmel, Ind. / Carmel) provided the squad's best Round-2 score. Sander was one of nine players in the field to go sub-70 in the afternoon round, carding a 2-under 69, his best round of the season and tied for the best round of his career.
• Sander made an astonishing 14-stroke improvement from Round 1 to Round 2. His second round featured a half dozen birdies.
• Redshirt junior Ryan Somerville (Aurora, Ontario / Aurora) is second on the team through 36 holes at 149. He shaved seven strokes off his Round-1 score with a 71 (E) in Round 2.
• The Beacons needed 303 strokes in Round 1 before improving to 288 in the afternoon, finishing the day at t-11 with a score of 591. The Beacons are even with former league foe Loyola Chicago and ahead of Houston Christian.
• South Alabama leads its home tournament at 549 and has the top individual in Hugo Thyr at 131 (-11).

Thoughts from Head Coach Dave Gring
"We continue to strive for consistent individual and team scores with our tournament rounds, especially coming off our last tournament a couple weeks ago. We had two distinctly different rounds today, and the first round was not up to our standards at all. We only made eight birdies and we had 28 bogeys in the first round. Our ball-striking wasn't good, and we really struggled with our approach shots into the greens – not hitting enough greens in regulation. Our scoring around the greens to save par wasn't able to carry us, especially with a lot of short side chips back to the pins. One bright spot was Adam's consistency during the round and rattling-off three birdies in a row on Holes 13-15."
 
"The second round was much improved and we had a Top-5 team score in the tournament field.  We made 14 birdies and an eagle, while we had 15 bogeys. The ball-striking was much sharper and our proximity was much improved. The speed of our putts on the greens was much better, from both longer distances and around the pin. Our Par-5 scoring improved a lot and we certainly took better advantage of the Par 5s. Owen led the way for us with six birdies, and Ryan had four birdies in the second round."
 
Up Next
The Beacons will close out the tournament with the third and final round on Tuesday. A link to live scoring via Clippd is available on ValpoAthletics.com.