INDIANAPOLIS – The GLVC Sports Network will stream 12 hours of coverage over three days of the 2016 Great Lakes Valley Conference Men's Golf Championship, which begins Sunday at Panther Creek Country Club in Springfield, Illinois.
This is the second time in the history of the Conference Championship that the event will be streamed.
GLVCSN will stream live and free coverage of the 38th annual event, which will be contested April 17-19 on a course that is hosting the three-day championship for the second time. Panther Creek Country Club, which hosted the event in 2011, will be set up at a par of 72 and 7,161 yards.
The GLVC Championship features a 54-hole stroke play event with the top four teams, after stroke play, competing in medal/match play to determine the Conference Champion. A total of 36 holes will be played on Sunday, April 17, followed by 18 holes on Monday, April 18. The semifinals and finals of match play will take place on Tuesday, April 19.
Threesomes will tee off beginning at 8 a.m. CT both on Sunday and Monday, with GLVCSN showcasing the No. 1 tee as well as coverage of the No. 9 and 18 holes from 7:45-10:30 a.m. John Edwards will be on the call throughout the duration of the Championship coverage. GLVCSN will be back on the air for a 30-minute recap of the first round from 3-3:30 p.m., as well as a round-two recap from 7:30-8 p.m.
On Monday, GLVCSN will provide tee-to-turn coverage from 7:45-10:30 a.m., followed by a 30-minute recap and awards ceremony show from 3:30-4 p.m.
Five hours of coverage will also be dedicated to the semifinal and final rounds of medal/match play throughout the day on Tuesday, beginning at 7:45 a.m.
Last year in medal/match play, No. 3 seed University of Missouri-St. Louis earned its first-ever GLVC Men’s Golf Championship with a 3-2 win over top-seeded Lewis University at Prairie View Golf Club in Carmel, Indiana.
UMSL returns to the GLVC Championships as the No. 1 seed for stroke play as the Tritons currently rank first in the Midwest Region rankings according to Golfstat. University of Indianapolis (2nd in the Midwest), and Lewis (8th) will compete in threesomes with UMSL, while Bellarmine University (9th), Drury University (14th), and University of Illinois Springfield (15th) will play in the second wave as teams seeded fourth through sixth, respectively. Teeing off third will be No. 7 seed McKendree University (16th), alongside No. 8 Rockhurst University (20th) and ninth-seeded University of Wisconsin-Parkside (22nd). Seeds 10-12 will respectively be University of Southern Indiana (23rd), Maryville University (26th) and Quincy University (27th), while 13th-seed William Jewell College (31st) and No. 14 Saint Joseph's College (32nd) round out the field.
UIndy leads the league with 15 titles, followed by Lewis and former GLVC member Northern Kentucky with six crowns each, while Bellarmine trails with five. Defending champs Missouri-St. Louis, Southern Indiana, UW-Parkside and former member Ashland have all claimed the GLVC Championship once.
The top-five finishers at the GLVC Championships are named All-GLVC, and the top-placing individual after 54-hole medal play earns medalist honors. The remaining golf awards, including All-Conference positions Nos. 6-10, as well as GLVC Player, Freshman, and Coach of the Year, are named prior to NCAA Regional competition.
Six of the current top-10 individuals from the Midwest Region hail from six different league schools, and all of the top-five finishers from last year's championship event return for a run at the crown. Defending Conference medalist Alex Thode of Lewis is one of those players, as he ranks sixth in the region. Thode shot a 2-under-par 214 (71-72-71) to earn a record nine-shot victory, besting the previous league record for margin of victory (7). Runner-up Talon Supak (68-79-76—223) returns for Illinois Springfield in his junior campaign as the fifth-ranked player in the region, and third-place finisher from UMSL Julien de Poyen (No. 21) will be competing after shooting 224 (72-73-79) as a sophomore. Reigning GLVC Freshman of the Year from Indianapolis Graham McAree (75-78-72—225) finished fourth at last year’s postseason event and enters the 2016 Championship as the highest regional seed from the GLVC at No. 2, while McKendree’s Keenai Sampson rounded out the best five a year ago with his 226 (79-73-74) and comes in with a ranking of third regionally.
The other top-10 Midwest Region ranked players that will look to vie for the individual title are No. 8 Markus Lindberg of UMSL and Bellarmine’s DJ Vogt (No. 9). Lindberg tied for 14th at last year’s championship with a 230 (75-77-78), while Vogt was a top-50 finisher in a tie for 48th at 243. In addition, reigning GLVC Player of the Month from Rockhurst, Nick Arman (No. 22), who tied for 20th a season ago and UWP’s Kyle Kolberg (No. 37) – the October Player of the Month and 2015 top-10 finisher (228) – will both be back once again.
Admission to the 2016 GLVC Men's Golf Championship is free to the public. Live streaming can be found on the GLVC Sports Network page at GLVCsports.com/watch, while live scoring through Golfstat, which will occur every three holes, is available on the GLVC Men's Golf Championship page at GLVCsports.com/GLVCmgolf16. Updates will also be included on the GLVC's official Twitter account (@GLVCsports) with the hashtags, #GLVCmgolf, #GLVCSN and #GLVCchamps.