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Princeton University
MacDonald Cup
Players Mentioned
Mitchell Wins Yale-Hosted MacDonald Cup
October 05, 2014 | Men's Golf
Princeton freshman Eric Mitchell turned rounds of 70 and 68 at the Yale-hosted MacDonald Cup into a tournament title Sunday, doing so in only his second collegiate tournament.
Greg Jarmas '14, at the 2013 Ivy League Championship, and Quinn Prchal, at the spring 2013 Century Intercollegiate, were the last Tiger and the last Tiger freshman, respectively, to win medalist honors.
"it was a fun event," Mitchell said. "I'm glad we got to play this year. I've played the course once before when I was still in high school. It's a very unique golf course in a lot of ways and every time you play it is a little bit different."
Mitchell didn't have the low round in either round of the 36-hole event, but consistency, or so it seemed from the results sheet, delivered the title. Once Saturday's suspended round finished Sunday morning, Yale's Li Wang was atop the leaderboard with his 67, three shots in front of Mitchell. Sunday's second round saw Harvard's Robert Deng also card a 67, but both Wang and Deng had 74s in their other round. The two were among the eight players to finish three shots behind Mitchell in a tie for second at +1 as Mitchell was the only player with a 36-hole red number at -2.
Mitchell had to stop play Saturday after 11 holes once rain rendered the course unplayable, and the Tiger rookie said the two days were completely different for him.
"On those 11 holes (Saturday), I was 2-over, nothing spectacular," Mitchell said. "I had one birdie, three bogeys, missed a few greens from perfect position, didn't make any putts outside of three feet. I was really just playing for survival."
That all turned around Sunday.
"My mindset was not really that aggressive at all," Mitchell said of Sunday's round. "I came out this morning and I had to finish first round and then play the second. I got hot and made eight birdies in 25 holes. Today was really a completely different day than yesterday, but that's golf and that's the Yale golf course especially."
Mitchell, a North Carolina native, hasn't yet been in school for a month but already has an accolade that many players don't achieve in four years of collegiate golf.
"Obviously I'm very happy with the results I had," Mitchell said. "I wasn't expecting that this early in my career. I was still getting adjusted to school, and the weather was bad for the first round. There are those weekends where you don't expect much and somehow it all works."
The hosts didn't leave The Course at Yale empty-handed, with Yale edging Harvard by one shot, +9 to +10. Kennesaw State took third at +15 with Princeton in fourth at +21. Of the 13 schools in the 14-team field (Yale fielded two teams), six Ivies were represented with Princeton coming in third among that group.
The Tigers will wrap the fall season Oct. 13-14 in California at the Berkeley-hosted Alister MacKenzie Invitational. Complete results are available at the PDF link on this page, and Princeton's results are below.
| 4 | Princeton | 296 | 285 | 581 | +21 |
| 1 | Eric Mitchell | 70 | 68 | 138 | -2 |
| T16 | Alex Dombrowski | 74 | 71 | 145 | +5 |
| T24 | Marc Hedrick | 74 | 74 | 148 | +8 |
| T36 | Michael Davis | 78 | 72 | 150 | +10 |
| 71 | Matthew Gerber (Individual) | 86 | 82 | 168 | +23 |
| DQ* | Jason Chen | DQ | 77 |