No. 2 UNC men's golf never quite got out of the woods at 2023 ACC Tournament

PINEHURST, N.C. — Looking at the final hole, you couldn’t see any Carolina blue on the green. 

Instead, it was poking out through a gap in the woods — where junior Ryan Smith was teeing up out of the pine needles to take a shot.

The scene perfectly summed up the ACC Championship weekend for the UNC men’s golf team — they never quite got out of the woods. After a rough start on Friday, the Tar Heels ultimately failed to make the cutoff for match play and tied for sixth place. 

The performance was uncharacteristic for the team, which is ranked No. 2 in the nation and is in the midst of a historic season. But throughout the three days of play, the players were unable to build up any forward momentum, which is what caused them to fall short in the end. 

“We just never found our rhythm at all this week,” head coach Andrew DiBitetto said. “We just looked off. And then when we were off, it just seemed like, sometimes you need something to go your way to kind of change the momentum. That never really happened. So just overall a below-average week all around.” 

Play commenced on Friday, and North Carolina immediately got out to a slow start. By the end of the day, the team found themselves sitting in seventh place at 2-over 578 after two rounds had been completed.

On Saturday morning, it looked momentarily as if things were turning around for the team. — immediately after teeing off, sophomore David Ford was playing to his usual standard and was under par.

“I was hitting it really well for the first two holes yesterday and felt really in control of my game,” he said. 

But then the rain started falling. What began as a temporary weather delay quickly turned into a postponement, and the tournament was halted for the remainder of Saturday. 

“The rain delay obviously hurt quite a bit,” senior Dylan Menante said. “We couldn’t do anything all day so it was kinda interesting just laying around all day and meandering — we couldn’t get much mojo.”

When the rain had finally cleared on Sunday morning, the team once again came out a bit slow. Throughout the front nine, the Tar Heels were not able to make much progress and stayed relatively stagnant in seventh place.

In the midst of the back nine, they made a surge forward, closing the gap to fourth to only two shots around the 15th hole. 

“I was like, 'I’ve got to make a difference', I got to make some birdies to actually help the cause,” Menante said. “So that was the main goal, to start hitting fairways and greens because the front nine was pretty rough and I was just trying to get my mojo back.”

The surge was ultimately unsuccessful though, due to a continuous lack of success in the player’s short games and the inability to put away birdies.

Coming down the stretch, the Tar Heels had one last opportunity to earn a bid to match play — needing two consecutive birdies from Smith and Menante to tie with Duke for fourth place.

Smith teed up and hit his drive directly into the woods. From there, it was a matter of recovery and he ended with par.

Menante’s drive went better, landing directly in the middle of the fairway. His next shot though cut extremely right, landing in the golf cart path where spectators were standing. From there, he chipped his ball into the sand trap twice before finally putting it in. 

“It would have helped if we could finish with some more birdies,” Menante said. “I know we kind of struggled and I didn’t hit my greatest on the last — my shot almost killed people — so a couple of birdies coming down the last hole would have helped.”

This inability to finish strong is something that the team targeted as needing to improve upon before NCAA regionals begin in mid-May. 

“Just coming down the stretch we got to get stronger, we got to grow more mentally,” Menante said. “Executing better for me is probably my biggest takeaway. Everyone will be a lot more motivated going into regionals.” 

@PeaceGwen

@dthsports | sports@dailytarheel.com

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