The Ferris State men’s golf team took sec­ond place in the Midwest Region Tournament III in Noblesville, Ind. over the weekend.

Senior Kurt Valley led the way for the Bulldogs as he recorded a team-best 143, which placed him tied for third over­all. Senior Eric Lilleboe was close behind as he fin­ished sixth over­all with a score of 144, which was even par for the 36-hole tournament.

As a team, Ferris fin­ished with 592 strokes, which was 12 shots behind tour­na­ment win­ner Wayne State which fin­ished with a 580 (+4). Wayne State came out on fire as they shot a 12-under par to take a 10-stroke lead over Ferris after the first round. The Bulldogs played two solid rounds, but were unable to catch the Warriors after their fast start.

Ferris head coach Mike Mignano said he was very happy with a second-place fin­ish. The field con­sisted of 23 teams from Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri.

“Obviously every­one wants to win, but you have to look at each week as a suc­cess know­ing that you did your best and you were pre­pared,” said Mignano.

The tour­na­ment marked the sec­ond in a row in which Ferris fin­ished as the runner-up. The Bulldogs will next be trav­el­ing to Findlay, Ohio to com­pete in the Findlay Outback Steakhouse Invitational on April 16.

Though Ferris did not win the tour­na­ment over the week­end, Mignano feels that the team is still play­ing very well. He said the team con­tin­ues to work on the things they need to indi­vid­u­ally to improve from week to week.

“We were close and some­times, in the game of golf, it just doesn’t go your way,” said Mignano.

Ferris will be hop­ing to con­tinue their solid play and claim their fourth first-place fin­ish of the sea­son. The Bulldogs have fin­ished either first or sec­ond in six tour­na­ments this sea­son. The team’s last first-place fin­ish was on Oct. 12, 2009 at the Wayne State Motor City Invite. n