SPOKANE, Wash. – The Gonzaga men's golf team looks to extend their season with solid performances at the West Coast Conference Championships Thursday through Saturday.
 
The annual 54-hole championship will be played at the Reserve at Spanos Park in Stockton, Calif. The University of the Pacific is hosting the tournament. The course hosts the 51st annual edition of the tournament for the first time.
 
"Each year we start the season talking about the conference championship and the goal of taking the title home," GU Head Coach Robert Gray said. "We've struggled with consistency this spring, but we're seeing more consistency in the past few weeks and we're excited to compete this week."
 
The field in order of their Golfstat rankings, the nine-team tournament includes No. 17 Pepperdine, No. 36 Brigham Young, No. 51 Saint Mary's, No. 71 San Francisco, No. 84 Santa Clara, No. 117 Loyola Marymount, No. 151 Pacific, No. 175 Gonzaga and No. 211 San Diego.
 
BYU and Pepperdine each won a pair of events in 2018-19. BYU won the William H. Tucker Invitational and its own Cougar Classic, while Pepperdine won the Alister Mackenzie Invitational and the Warrior Princeville Makai Invitational. Three WCC student-athletes rank in the top-80 nationally according to GolfStat: BYU's Peter Kuest (7), Pepperdine's Clay Feagler (29) & Joshua McCarthy (80)
 
Defending champion Pepperdine has finished first or second at the WCC Championships in 25 of the last 32 seasons securing a conference-best 19 titles. San Francisco is next with 11. Since 2010 BYU (2), Pepperdine (3) & Saint Mary's (3) have won multiple championships. The Dons won the 2011 event.
 
Pepperdine cruised to the team title last year's WCC Championship at 26-under (838). Four Waves ended in the Top-10, led by Clay Feagler's first place finish. Saint Mary's finished second at one-under (863).
 
Feagler took medalist honors at 14-under (202). He carded a 63 (-9) in Round 3. Perry Cohen of Saint Mary's was second at six-under (210), and Pepperdine's Joshua McCarthy and Rhett Rasmussen of Loyola Marymount were third at five-under (211).
 
Gonzaga's David Ganz finished his collegiate career in a tie for 19^th. He finished a consistent week with a 74 (+2) in the third and final round. He opened the tournament with a 73 and had a 72 in the second round. Ganz ended the event at three-over (219).
 
As a team, Gonzaga was 22-over (886) in ninth-place. Tyler Munetake (40th) and Nick Nolan (T41st) finished 14-over (230) and 15-over (231).
 
The Zags best-ever finish at the WCC Championships was tied for third with an 880 total in 2013. Gonzaga's lowest score was 867 in 2012. The Bulldogs finished fourth that season. No GU men's golfer has ever won the event, but James Fahy and Sean Walsh placed second and third in 2013. Fahy was two-under (214) and Walsh was one-under (215).
 
Munetake, Charlie Magruder, Chris Mogg, Grant Johnson and Nolan represent GU at this year's championship.
 
"The wind can pick up in the afternoon and the course is more open than most, but it will be interesting to see how long the rough will be and the condition of the greens when we play the practice round," Gray said."
 
All three rounds of this year's championships begin at 7:30 a.m. Live scoring will be available on GoZags.com with links to GolfStat.com.