MU golfer finishes 24th in Indiana in spite of illness
Golfer said an attitude change would help team improve.
Published Sept. 25, 2007
Twelfth out of sixteen wasn't the finish the MU men's golf team wanted, but for junior Peter Malnati the Wolf Run Intercollegiate in Zionsville, Ind. was worse than just that.
Malnati finished the tournament tied for 24th place, with a three-round score of 222, and it was a hard-earned tie for 24th at that.
Malnati appeared to have had a bout with food poisoning from some chicken parmesan he ate the night before the tournament.
"It was hard to walk," Malnati said. "It was one of the few times in my life when I didn't want to be on a golf course. It was a struggle. I had no energy, no strength at all."
Freshmen Tyler Hillis, who finished in 68th place overall with a score of 235, and the rest of Malnati's teammates saw their fellow Tiger vomiting on the side of the course and lying down in between shots.
"It's hard enough to walk 36 when you feel fine, but when you're laying on the ground puking — he beat me puking — it's pretty unbelievable he even finished," Hillis said. "It really makes you feel bad when a guy puking beats you. If he's feeling halfway decent next tournament, he should play really good."
Junior Bud Reynolds said he doesn't think Malnati's performance was affected by the food poisoning, and said he was impressed with the way his teammate handled being sick.
"I don't think it affected his score," Reynolds said. "He was tough about it, he didn't let it bring him down. I don't think he let it get in the way."
Malnati's main concern wasn't being sick, but rather the team's performance.
"In order to do well, we need people to finish in the top 10," Malnati said. "The fact that I was the low man on our team this week and I finished 24th is not good."
Malnati isn't blaming the chicken parmesan for his self-proclaimed "poor play," and said he believes the entire team needs to take a new attitude toward the season.
Malnati said their scores at home are not near as good as they should be for the qualifying rounds the Tigers play in Columbia to prepare for tournaments.
"These golf courses are much easier than the courses we play in tournaments," he said. "In order to really have confidence going into a tournament we need to be shooting under par on the courses around here all the time, and that hasn't been the case."
Reynolds, who came in second for the Tigers by tying for 37th place, also said he believes in order for the team to live up to its potential in tournaments, it needs to start with a change here at home.
"I think we settle for too little," Reynolds said. "It needs to get better, and we need to have an attitude where we're not happy with just playing OK, or shooting 75 out here. That's terrible. It's just a mindset we need to get going, it's not good enough to just play OK."
