What it takes to make it to the NCAA Nationals - Decoding Ohio State Men’s Golf Team Performance

Ohio State Men’s Golf Team

Ohio State Men’s Golf Team Category Leaders

Scoring

  • Ohio State have had a scoring average of +1.39 in all rounds played on their way to Nationals with recent Masters competitor Neal Shipley leading the way for the team with a scoring average of -1.33 per round, half a shot better than 2nd ranked played Maxwell Moldovan at -0.80.

  • Neal is the only player who has had a positive strokes gained in every round and leads in par 5 scoring at -0.54 per hole, gaining 0.26 strokes per hole vs the rest of the team.

  •  Maxwell has been excellent on the par 4’s at -0.01 per hole being the only player to average these under par and gained 0.16 strokes vs the team. 

  • As a team, Ohio state have struggled on the par 3’s with an average of +0.21 per hole and have also seen a high double or worse rate at 0.66 per round.

  • Round 2 has been the team’s best performing round with a strokes gained of -2.91, a third of a stroke better than R1 and 0.88 strokes better than R3.

Off The Tee

  • The team are strongest off the tee with five players having a positive strokes gained and a team average of -0.19 per round.

  • An overall solid driving distance of 293Y is supported by good accuracy finding 60% of fairways.

  • The team’s Major & Penalty miss is on the high side at 10%, but it is no surprise that 4 of the top 5 drivers are all better than the team average in this category.

  • Neal leads the way off the tee at +0.92 per round thanks to a driving distance of 307Y and 65% of fairways found whilst keeping his major miss low at 5.5%

  • Whilst Jacob ranked 11th in SG driving due to a distance of 271Y, he is actually the team’s 2nd most accurate with 52% of tee shots finishing inside a 25Y zone. 

Approach

  • The team have a strokes gained average of -0.86 in approach play and average 60% of greens hit from all approach shots outside of 50Y.

  • The leading 6 players are all well ahead of this, with Maxwell being the strongest at +0.45 per round who tops the category in every distance range from the fairway

  • All bar one of the bottom 5 players in approach play have a high hard or penalty miss, meaning not only are they missing greens, but missing in difficult positions.

  • The team can look to find improvements across 100-200Y where they have lost a total of 0.76 strokes per round and gives a good indication as to why their par 3 scoring is high with many likely falling in this range.

Short Game

  • Despite seeing a number of hard shots around the green, 9% more than the team average, Jakob Tarney still manages to be the strongest player inside 50Y. 

  • He gains an impressive +0.28 per shot from the easy shots and +0.07 from medium shot types.

  • Jackson Chandler is the best from the standard bunker shot, gaining 0.20 per shot vs the rest of the team.

  • Missing in the correct spots, and easy positions around the green shows its importance for the team as they gain an impressive +0.12 per shot. 

  • Compare this to the hard shots where they lose an average of -0.25, a difference of 0.37 per shot. A player who has 3 hard short game shots in a round vs a player who has 3 easy shots will see a whole stroke difference just from this alone.

Putting

  • The team have averaged -1.16 per round on the greens and should be a key focal point for them moving forward.

  • Jacob tops the list at -0.44 per round despite being below team average from 3-5ft he makes up for it in every other range whilst Adam and Tyler are the only two players that have gained strokes from 5-10ft.

  • Speed control is usually the deciding factor from mid to long range and with Upgame pro’s unique ‘good putt metric’ it gives a clear indication how players pace control is. For Ohio state this is another area that the team can find an improvement on the greens, in particular from 40ft+ where as a team they average 55% of putts finishing within 8% of the start distance.

  • Combine this with a loss of -0.15 strokes per round from 3-5ft it creates a clear picture that the probability of 3 putts is quite high from long range. 

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D1 Men - Strokes Gained Categories

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ETSU Men’s Golf Performance Breakdown