Newton, KS -- The Indian Hills Warriors left no doubt as to who was the best Division I golf team in the country in the 2012 National Championship this week. The Warriors took an eight-shot lead into the final round on Friday, doubled that advantage midway through the round, and wound up with a 13-shot margin for the school's second straight DI national title.
Western Texas started the final round in second place and never did push the Warriors, finishing well off the pace in the runnerup spot. Odessa College was another eight strokes behind in 3rd place, a whopping 21 shots in back of Indian Hills.
IHCC sophomore Jon Paul Blampied just missed a piece of the individual title as his final-round 71 left him one shot behind Meridian's Jake Stirling. Those two had the only under-par rounds of the day and Blampied was unable to make up the one-shot lead Stirling had going into the final 18 holes. Blampied, the only player back from last year's IHCC championship team, finished one stroke under par for the torney with a 287 total.
Indian Hills quickly put to rest any hopes their pursuers may have had that the lead the Warriors started the day with would vanish when they played the first six holes in four-over par. That allowed them to increase the lead they began the day with, and they continued to build on the lead by compiling a team score of five-over on the next six holes.
The conditions on Friday were the toughest they were during the four-day tourney with 45-mile-an-hour winds. But the Warriors were unfazed in notching the third national golf title in IHCC history, the last two Division I crowns.
After struggling through the first two rounds, IHCC soph Monty Lack came through over the second half of the tourney. He followed a second-round 82 with back-to-back 73s and wound up tied for 24th place.
Ben Ludlam, who started his week by accepting the Phil Mickelson Award given to the nation's best freshman junior college golfer, ended in a tie for 6th place with a 296 total.
Indian Hills was expected to be in the hunt for the national title when the week began, and coach Mike Hagen said his squad embraced the challenge. "Everyone expected us to be right in there going in," said Hagen. "About five or six teams had a shot to win it. The difference is we believed we could do it."
Indian Hills' triumph in the national tournament extended a tremendous stretch they put together in the spring season. The Warriors won their final five meets of the spring. They won seven invitationals in all, including the fall campaign, and were first or second in nine of the 12 meets in which they played in the two seasons.
NJCAA Division I National Championship
Team Scores (top ten)
1. Indian Hills 292-294-296-303=1185; 2. Western Texas CC 292-295-303-308=1198; 3. Odessa College 297-292-306-311=1206; 4. Meridian CC 299-296-297-318=1210; 5. Darton CC 300-295-304-314=1213; 6. Midland College 296-296-315-311=1214; 7. Dodge City CC 308-296-306-311=1221; 8. Brevard CC 302-298-310-313=1223; 9. Central Alabama CC 305-285-318-316=1224; 10. McLennan CC 299-292-312-325=1228
Indian Hills Scores:
2. Jon Paul Blampied 67-76-73-71=287; T6. Ben Ludlam 73-70-75-78=296; T24. Monty Lack 77-82-73-73=305; T30. Mitch Tucker 77-73-76-81=307; T37. William White 75-75-75-84=309
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