Scarlet Sunrise: Buckeyes men's golf set to tee off at NCAA Championship

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Buckeyes men’s golf set to tee off at NCAA Championship

Ohio State finished 15th at the NCAA Championship last summer. The Buckeyes are in Carlsbad, California, this weekend to finish better than that — and compete for a national title for a third straight year.

The Buckeyes’ lineup of Neal Shipley, Jackson Chandler, Maxwell Moldovan, Adam Wallin and Tyler Sabo will look to win the national title this weekend at the Omni La Costa Resort & Spa. Jack Vojtko will be the alternate.

This will be the final college tournament in the careers of Shipley, the low amateur at The Masters in April who will be in the US Open field at Pinehurst No. 2 next month, Moldovan, who made the cut at last year’s US Open, and Wallin.

Ohio State finished fourth at the Baton Rouge regional last week, giving it the final spot at the regional for the NCAA Championship. Neal Shipley shot even-par last week to finish in ninth place.

Ohio State has two team national title, those coming in 1945 and 1979. Jack Nicklaus won an individual national championship in 1961 — the same year he finished tied for seventh at the Masters and tied for fourth as the low amateur at the US Open. Clark Burroughs also won the individual national title in 1985.

Golf Channel will broadcast live coverage beginning of the NCAA Championship final round of stroke play on Monday. Golf Channel will also show two days of match play on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Marvin Harrison Jr. signs rookie contract with Arizona Cardinals

Signing a rookie contract is almost always a formality, but it’s a milestone nonetheless. Marvin Harrison Jr., the highest-drafted wide receiver in Ohio State history, reached that milestone Thursday.

Harrison signed the league’s standard four-year rookie contract with a team option for a fifth year. But because the Arizona Cardinals picked Harrison No. 4 overall in this year’s draft, his contract comes with a meaty and fully-guaranteed $35.37 million, including a $22.5 million signing bonus, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

Last year, Harrison won the Biletnikoff Award, given annually to the best receiver in college football, and became a Heisman Trophy finalist.

He was targeted 114 times in 2023, almost at least twice as many times as every other Buckeyes receiver, according to Pro Football Focus. The 6-foot-3 and rangy yet muscular Harrison accounted for close to a quarter of Ohio State’s total offense and more than a quarter of its touchdowns during the regular season. As a junior, he recorded 67 receptions for 1,211 yards and 14 touchdowns, not to mention his first career rushing touchdown.

The year before that, Harrison hauled in 72 passes for 1,157 yards and 12 scores.

Harrison is now part of a Cardinals organization that has made the playoffs only once in the last eight seasons. But Arizona built momentum down the stretch of last year, thanks to the return of quarterback Kyler Murray, who recovered from his 2022 ACL tear and ushered more optimism into the early stages of the Jonathan Gannon era in the desert.

Building the perfect Ryan Day-coached quarterback

Ryan Day is entering his sixth season as Ohio State’s head coach but his eighth season overall with the Buckeyes. Day, who originally joined the program as co-offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach, has worked with five different full-time Ohio State starting quarterbacks: J.T. Barrett (2017), Dwayne Haskins (2018), Justin Fields (2019-20), C.J. Stroud (2021-22) and Kyle McCord (2023).

As part of Lettermen Row “Quarterbacks Week,” our very own Andy Backstrom pulled from that pool to build the perfect Day-coached Buckeyes quarterback — with some rules.

You won’t want to miss this.

READ: Building the perfect Ryan Day-coached Ohio State quarterback

Counting Down

Buckeyes vs. Akron: 99 days
Buckeyes vs. Michigan: 190 days

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