Sooners enjoying underdog role
NORMAN — A year ago, the Oklahoma men's golf program was the pursued.
Coming off a national championship in 2017, the Sooners were followed by Golf Channel cameras and everyone else around the sport.
It was almost a foregone conclusion that Oklahoma would square off against Oklahoma State in the match play finals.
But the Sooners run ended with a quarterfinals loss to Auburn.
This year, the cameras are once again following around Oklahoma State, but instead of the Sooners, Auburn is one of three featured teams along with Alabama heading into this year's national tournament at Blessings Golf Course in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
“It didn't happen, but it's given us motivation for this year,” Sooners coach Ryan Hybl said. “The show's on again right now. I'm sure they're watching it and ultimately it's hopefully
going to provide a little bit of a chip on our shoulder for what happened last year and also knowing that we can go do it again.”
Falling short a year ago has helped the Sooners cultivate their identity around grit.
“I genuinely feel like if we're going to outfight everybody that we're going to beat people that maybe just have a little more give up in them,” Hybl said. “Our sport, it's a tough one. You get down on yourself and before you know it, you look up — you can't afford to do that. You've got to keep fighting and pushing through and fight for every single shot, and I think our guys, this group that we have right now, they will do a good job of that this week.”
The Sooners still have two players on the roster who played major roles in that national championship team — Brad Dalke and Blaine Hale — and all but one of the five primary players from last year's squad.
But this season hasn't always been smooth sailing, with Dalke struggling over long stretches and the rest of the team playing uneven.
“We all know we're better than that,” Dalke said. “We knew we could start getting better and keep getting our games good getting into nationals. I don't mind us not being talked about. It's fine. I think we all know we're the best team in the nation when we're all playing well.”
The Sooners have finished third in each of their last five events dating back to early March. But that, junior Quade Cummins said, doesn't tell the whole story.
“We feel momentum,” Cummins said. “I know we didn't win regional, but we got our postseason lowest schoolrecord. We shot the same score every single day, so we got that. We wanted to go win and prove a point that we were a No. 1 seed.”