SLATE: Kansas State’s Jeremy Gandon wins Hawkeye Invitational

Wins aren’t something the K-State men’s golf team is used to. But for the second time in three years, one Wildcat golfer has captured an individual title. Jeremy Gandon shot a 2-under 70 in the second round of the Hawkeye Invitational at Finkbine Golf Course in Iowa City. Following yesterday’s 6-under 66, that was enough to hang onto the lead through two rounds; the weather did the rest, as the third round was cancelled.

The win is Gandon’s second as a Wildcat. The other was also in Iowa, in Gandon’s second collegiate event, the 2016 Golfweek Conference Challenge at Spirit Hollow in Burlington.

The team, overall, shot 17-over in the final round despite Gandon’s solid 18. They finished in third place at 11-over, four strokes behind Iowa State and one back of the Hawkeyes. K-State notes that this is the team’s second straight top-three finish in a tournament, which would be pretty swell if the last two tournaments hadn’t been four-team affairs.

Next weekend: the Big 12 Championships, at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa.

Track and Field

The women held onto second place on the final day of the Texas Invitational in Austin, while the men got caught from behind despite a respectable 33-point day to finish tied for third with Princeton at 75 points, half a point back of second-place Stephen F. Austin and 40 behind the hosting champions. The women trailed the Longhorns by 59 points, 188.5 to 129.5, but maintained a huge lead over third-place Texas State’s 83.5 score.

In the first men’s event of the day, K-State regained over half of the 19-point deficit with which they entered the day, as Bryan Zack (15:26.44) and Joe Gorthy (15:38.00) finished 3-4 in the men’s 5000m, a race in which Texas had no entrants. Brett Neelly’s third place finish in the discus at 52.73m was better than any one Longhorn; the problem was that Texas had two throwers place, 4th and 6th, and regained two points. But failure to score in the 4x100, 110m hurdles, and 800m (not surprising) and the high jump (wait, WHAT?) opened the door for the Longhorns to open the lead and for SFA and Princeton to start their charge.

Justin Davis took ninth overall in the 400m at 47.91s, but was sixth among college participants, thus bringing home three points. Terrell Smith was fourth in the 100m at 10.35s, but second collegiately, good for another eight. Isaac Smallwood posted a 13.79m best in the triple jump, just missing the points in ninth place.

But as the meet wound down, K-State’s men were again kept off the scoreboard. No points were to be had in the pole vault, 400m hurdles, or 3000m. Despite all this, the team clung to second place heading into the day’s final event, the 4x400 relay. Unfortunately, SFA finished second in that event, and Princeton took fourth; that was enough for both schools to reel in the Wildcats, as the team of Devie Freeman, Davis, Nick Albus, and Tom Pyle finished in seventh at 3:18.66.

Still, a good outing overall for the men’s team, which has lagged a bit behind the women of late.

As for the women, the first four events of the day were scoreless, and that pretty much buried their hopes of catching the Longhorns. But Ariel Okorie picked up a couple of points in the 100m hurdles (13.84s), with Lauren Taubert (14.02s) just missing the final points place. Then A’Keyla Mitchell (53.53s) and Ranae McKenzie (54.19s) finished 2-3 in the 400m, earning 14 points and picking four points up on the Horns despite Zola Golden actually winning the race.

The teams then traded off burying each other in single events. K-State got six points off the 100m as Wurrie Njadoe (11.88s) and Claudette Allen (11.97s) finished fourth and eighth among college competitors (sixth and tenth overall), but Texas raked in 18 points for the top two college spots. The Cats turned the tables in the triple jump, however. Shardia Lawrence (13.24) and Konstantina Romaiou (12.85m) finished 1-2, good for 18 points and a 14-point gain on the Horns.

K-State continued piling up points over the next three events. The Cats outscored Texas 19-6 in the discus and 9.5-0 in the high jump; in between, Texas took an 18-6 edge in the 400m hurdles. The discus rout was led by Shadae Lawrence winning the event with a throw of 58.68m; Ashley Petr (48.63m) and Taylor Latimer (48.37m) joined Lawrence in the points, finishing fifth and seventh. Lauren Taubert was responsible for K-State’s points in the 400m hurdles, crossing the finish line in 1:00.12 for fourth place. The high jump was perhaps a disappointment for K-State, as Morgan Coffman was tied for third at 1.73m and Shanae McKenzie fifth at 1.68m.

The women’s 3000m was scoreless, and the women’s day ended with the 4x400, in which K-State team of Okorie, Shanae McKenzie, Coffman, and Keiteyana Parks finished ninth at 3:58.12. They got a point anyway, as SFA had two relay teams in the top eight and under relay rules you can only score one.

On Wednesday over in Lawrence, the Wildcats will participate in the Kansas Relays Quadrangular, facing the host Jayhawks, Nebraska, and Harvard. The decathlon and heptathlon will be Wednesday and Thursday, with the main meet taking place Friday and Saturday.

Football

Tim Bisel at the Capital-Journal reports on Mike McCoy and why he’s possibly not getting the chances you’d expect from a talented back.

Men’s Basketball

Keegan Pope at Rivals reports that Illinois transfer Mark Smith is not coming to K-State, because he’s going to Mizzou. Whether this is because he’d rather go to Missouri or because it turns out K-State’s done creating roster spots is unknown.

Baseball

No. No, no, twenty-six times no.