May 9, 2005
FARMVILLE, Va. -- Longwood University men’s golf standouts Trey Deal/Martinsville (Martinsville) and Chris Shuford/Fredericksburg (Colonial Forge) have been named to the 2005 Division I All-Independent Men’s Golf Team. Deal and Shuford were each a second-team selection among the 22 honorees from the 15 NCAA Division I independent member institutions. Scott Jamieson of Augusta State, a team ranked sixth in Division I, was chosen as Player of the Year with his independent-best 72.3 scoring average.
“It's a great honor for Trey and Chris to be named to the All-Independent team,” said eighth-year Longwood head coach Kevin Fillman. “They were certainly our most consistent scorers throughout the year. Both had a several low rounds, but, more importantly, both had only a couple poor rounds. We knew we could count on both of them to give us scores we could use pretty much every day. They certainly deserve to be included among this group of players.”
Deal, a senior, posted a new school-record 74.54 scoring average over 26 rounds, including one Top Five among seven Top 20 individual finishes in 10 tournaments. He finished his outstanding career with six new school-records: 18-holes (66), season scoring average, career scoring average (75.31), junior-year scoring average (74.68), senior-year scoring average, rounds under par (15), and rounds in the 60s (6, three this year). Additionally, in the GolfStat Division I National Rankings as of May 6, Deal ranked first in putts per green in regulation (1.683), and putts per round (26.42), and sixth in total short-game par saves (.688, 176-256). He is actually ranked number one in the two putting categories among all collegiate golfers, in all divisions (over 7,000).
Shuford, a sophomore, averaged 75.26 over 23 rounds, including three Top Five individual finishes in nine tournaments. He established a new school-record for 54-holes with his 67-72-69-208 while winning the Bowling Green/John Piper Intercollegiate in Ohio last September 13-14. The outstanding eight-under par effort at BGSU included two eagles and 14 birdies en route to the tournament triumph. Shuford had three rounds in the 60s this year.
Longwood finished the 2004-05 campaign with a new school-record team scoring average of 299.59 while earning five Top Five and eight Top 10 finishes among 11 tournaments. The Lancers could return as many as six letterwinners for 2005-06, the final year of the program’s Division I Reclassification. The NCAA accepted the institution’s men’s golf program into the Multidivisional Reclassification process last fall which will lead to the sport being officially certified Division I as of September 1, 2006, a full year ahead of the official certification for Longwood’s remaining 12 sport programs.
