PEORIA, Ill. -- After the best finish at the Missouri Valley Conference Men's Golf Championship since 1986 last year with a third-place showing, the Bradley men's golf team looks to once again finish near the top of the team standings when the Braves head to the Golf Club at Porto Cima in Sunrise Beach, Mo., for the 2015 championship Monday and Tuesday.
Play at the par-72 Club at Porto Cima will get under way Monday with an 8:30 a.m. shotgun start and feature 36 holes on the opening day. Tuesday's final round will tee off at 8 a.m. BradleyBraves.com will provide a link to live scoring for all three rounds.
The Braves, who were picked fourth in the pre-championship poll, are one of three teams to have three players ranked among the top 15 individuals in the MVC.
Senior Danny Masrin (Palatine, Ill./Jakarta International School) has finished in the top 20 in each of the last two MVC Championships, earning All-MVC honors after he tied for fifth in last year's event played in Silvis, Ill. Masrin has finished in the top five in each of his last two tournaments and has a team-best 74.11 stroke average, which would be the lowest at Bradley since Andy Mickelson had a school record 73.28 average in 2002-03.
Currently third in school history with 92 career sub-80 rounds, Masrin needs two rounds in the 70's to pass Dave Wettlaufer for second. He and fellow senior Seth Trolia (Mahomet, Ill./Seymour) are the only individuals at Bradley to post three seasons with 25 or more sub-80 rounds.
Trolia is looking to join Mickelson and Steve Douse as the only individuals in school history to have 30 or more sub-80 rounds in a season, needing two to reach the mark. Trolia has the seventh most rounds played in school history at 114 and should become the first Braves since John Joyce in 1992 to reach 117 career rounds played. Currently second in school history with a 75.31 career stroke average, Trolia is third on the squad this year at 74.73.
Junior Lyle Burns (Mahomet, Ill./Seymour/Parkland) owns a 74.38 stroke average this spring and is second on the team with a 74.57 average this season. Burns has placed in the top 20 in each of the last four tournaments and seven of 10 events in his first year on The Hilltop. He enters the MVC Championship with a streak of 11 consecutive sub-80 rounds, which includes four rounds in the 60's.
Fellow junior Garrett Cox (Mahomet, Ill./Seymour) matched a season-best with a second-round 73 in the second round at the Beu/Mussatto Invitational earlier this week, where he turned in his lowest 54-hole score of the spring (230) to tie for 13th.
Freshman Daniel Lensing (Spring Park, Minn./Orono) has been slowed by an injury this spring, but tied Cox for 13th at the Beu/Mussatto Invite in his only 54-hole outing of the spring to lower his season average to 77.53.
