Wake Forest fails to advance to match play at ACC mens golf championship

Wake Forest's men's golf team lost in a playoff to Duke for the final spot into match play at the ACC championship at Shark's Tooth Golf Course in Panama City Beach, Florida.

Only the top eight teams advanced to match play and after 54 holes the Demon Deacons and Blue Devils were tied for the final spot.

"It's a very dejected group tonight as you can understand," Wake Forest Coach Jerry Haas said on Saturday. "We played well the first day and actually played pretty well day two. Today we didn't play terribly, but have to play a little better down the stretch. We were in great position with a few holes to go and we had to count five bogeys."

Senior Jakob Melin shot 71 on Saturday to finish 6 under for the tournament to tie for fifth place. It was his fourth top five finish of the season.

The Demon Deacons, who are ranked 31st, were 3 over par for 54 holes.

Junior Tom Haberer tied for 33rd and junior Kyle Haas tied for 36th. Freshman Lorenzo Rodriguez and junior Nicholas Prieto made their ACC Championship debuts this week, both finishing stroke play in a tie for 56th place.

"Hats off to Duke, they played their final nine holes in nine under to tie us and then beat us in the playoff," Jerry Haas said.

Wake Forest will be in regional play next and will play host at Bermuda Run Country Club in mid-May.

There are six regional sites and Bermuda Run is one of them.

"We will be hosting regionals at Bermuda Run in three weeks," Haas said. "As the players have said, ‘21 days and counting, we will be back at it this week (in practice)'"

Haas said one of his team's downfalls was too many bad holes. They made plenty of birdies but that wasn't enough to advance.

"We usually make a ton of birdies, no exception this week that we were in the top three teams in birdies made but have to start cleaning up a little bit off the tee and around the greens," Haas said. "The players put so much effort into being great at the end of the year. We are always proud of their efforts, and I know they wanted better for the Deacs."

The Demon Deacons will be playing host for a regional at a course where the program won an NCAA championship in 1986.

"We still have regionals and then NCAAs to look forward to," Haas said. "The pieces are in place; we just have to put it all together."

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