A New Year ....

Hello Friends of Stanford Men's Golf....

It has been a few months since I have checked in personally on the blog. My new Assistant Phil has done a great job posting some fun pictures and updates the last few posts so credit to him!

We are at that time of year where the butterflies start to crank up and the eager anticipation for the spring schedule comes to life. We all believe we have a great team and now the challenge is to put it on show and do what it takes in preparation to let it all come forward. All I can say is that on campus right now the Cardinal mojo is high! What a win in the Orange Bowl, the Women hoopsters knocking off UConn, and the Men's Basketball team taking down the top team in the Pac-10 a few days back with their win against the Washington Huskies. All good vibes!!! This makes us all feel like good things are in store for Men's Golf.

The team enjoyed their time off and in impressive fashion did really well on their fall quarter finals. It is great validation for the players that come here to know that they might miss as much or more school than any team in the Athletic Department but yet the team GPA usually is north of 3.2, Impressive to say the least and credit to the team for their hard work both on and off the golf course.

We are now immersed in our off season training regimen of workouts three days per week and practice on the Stanford Course and Siebel Complex. The guys have enjoyed a few new practice games that Coach Rowe has also implemented testing all facets of their game.

We are all preparing for our next big event which will take place the first week of Feb. on the Big Island of Hawaii. It is the strongest field we will play in all year as teams from all over the country fly in to enjoy the beautiful weather and good competition. This year we will compete on the Waikoloa Kings Course which is gem and a very strong test of golf. It is neat to see how intense qualifying is for this first tournament among the guys. This is driven both by the hard work they have put in over the winter as well as the keen draw of the destination. Let's see ... playing golf in Hawaii for the week or staying back on campus to study... the preference is very clear!!! Our record in Hawaii has been solid over the years ... we have come out victorious two out of the last three years! Lets see what happens.

On the home front, we are all very excited to be following the exploits of our first PGA Tour Players in a while. Zack Miller and Joe Bramlett played really well at the Q-school this past fall and both are one event into their rookie year on Tour. I never knew PGATour.com could garner so much of my attention following their scores! Also fun to see David Chung enjoy a few weeks as the World's #1 ranked amateur according to the R&A. Impressive to say the least and we are all eager to see how he plays this winter and spring.

Also on the radar around here is the upcoming Pac-10 Men's Golf Championship that will be held at Stanford April 29,30 and May 1. We only host once every 10 or now 12 years so we are working hard to make it very memorable. Stanford's last Pac-10 crown was in 1994 so we have something to prove on our home course. Focusing on the process and quality preparation will get us where we want to go.

We continue to be very appreciate of the support that we get from the Stanford Golf Community and people like you. Thanks for reading our blog and checking out www.stanfordmensgolf.org. I have a feeling that this team can make their marks on the record book if things go the right way .... Go Cardinal!

Coach Ray