Before the season began, Saint Peter’s head coach Peter Falloon said the Rutgers Invitational would be a measuring stick for teams in the MAAC. The invitational ended up a mixed bag for teams from the MAAC.
Falloon’s Peacocks finished 14th, Fairfield finished third, Iona finished ninth, Monmouth finished 12th and Manhattan finished 18th out of 18 teams.
State of MAAC Golf and Where the Jaspers Fit In
Jaspers head coach Jerry Wood was not happy with his team’s performance one bit. He summed up the weekend in one word: “Poorly.”
“We played very poorly at Rutgers,” Wood said. “There were a lot of mistakes, a lot of mental mistakes. I think the throwaway shots might not focus on what we’re telling them, which is each week really think about each hole and play it like a chess match as opposed to just getting up there and whacking it and ending up in trouble.”
Junior James Edgeworth could not figure out why the team struggled so much besides being bested by every participating MAAC team.
“The other MAAC teams, they did better than us. We came in last, obviously,” said Edgeworth. “We just have to do better next time. I think that gives them the edge over us.”
At the beginning of golf’s fall season, the reigning conference champion Peacocks looked likely to defend their title, but were greatly disappointed at Rutgers, which Falloon said “is not a hard golf course. It’s a short pretty easy golf course.”
The same can be said of the Stags because of their impressive top three finish. They seemed to be turning into an early top seed favorite until they had a poor showing at their most recent outing at the Hartford Hawks Invitational, where they came in 13th.
After such a mediocre weekend for all teams, except for Fairfield, Falloon only thought about retracting his earlier quote but he still said Rutgers was “…a good beginning indication of the top teams in the MAAC.” Although he did add that “it’s hard to get a complete gage because not every coach is playing the team he will be playing in the spring.”
What Are Some Takeaways?
The invitational proved three things:
1) There is no clear No. 1 seed as of right now.
2) Any team can take home the MAAC title when the spring portion of the golf season rolls around.
3) The competition level is going to be extremely high come springtime.
Falloon added a fourth: freshman impact.
“The league as a whole is stronger this year, and it is going to be more competitive than ever because of the new freshman in the league,” said Falloon.