No. 20 Men's Golf at the Gate City Invitational
Monday, September 14-Tuesday, September 15 | 8 a.m.
Forest Oaks Country Club | Greensboro, N.C. 

WHAT TO KNOW
•    The 20th-ranked Babson men's golf team will open the 2026-27 season at the 54-hole Gate City Invitational in Greensboro, N.C., for hte first time in school history. 
•    The Beavers will play 36 holes on Monday and 18 holes on Tuesday against some of the top Division III programs in the country on the 7,020-yard par-72 layout at Forest Oaks Country Club. 

LOOKING BACK ON 2025-26
•    The Beavers won both the 54-hole Williams Invitational and the 36-hole Farmingdale State Invitational while recording four top-five finishes in nine events last spring. 
•    Babson played some of its best golf over the final month of the regular season, placing 10th at the Jekyll Island Collegiate Invitational and fourth at the Sam Snead Collegiate to help the program earn its first NCAA Division III Championship berth since 2022. 
•    The Green and White shot 297-304 and finished 21st at 29-over, missing the 36-hole cut by three strokes at Mission Inn Resort and Club in Howey-in-the-Hills, Fla., back in May. 

ABOUT THE BEAVERS
•    Babson returns three of its top five players and seven athletes in all from its 2025-26 squad that posted a 294.28 scoring average and finished 23rd in the Division III Scoreboard rankings. 
•    Junior Aman Vantipalli shot 70-75-79-70 to tie for 49th place overall at 7-over at the NCAA Championship, and earned a GCAA All-America honorable mention for the second year in a row after posting a 73.26 stroke average that included four top-15 and six top-30 finishes in nine starts. 
•    Senior Jack Berry garnered PING/GCAA All-Region I accolades for the second year in a row thanks to a 74.28 stroke average that included one victory and five top-30 results. 
•    Junior Chad Tordone (76.12) played in all 25 rounds and also garnered all-region laurels, classmate Howie Poon posted a 73.60 average in 10 rounds, and sophomores Luke Walker (76.00) and Mason Malouf (76.67) both played three rounds during their rookie campaign. 

GOING LOW
•    Berry finished under par seven times in 25 rounds last season, which includes shooting 68 three times, winning Middlebury's Duke Nelson Invitational with a 36-hole total of 3-under 138 and posting a score of 4-under at the 54-hole Jekyll Island Collegiate Invitational in late March. 
•    Vantipalli finished under par six times and shot 66 at both the Williams Invitational and Jekyll Island College Invitational. 
•    Tordone recorded the low round of his career, a 5-under 65, to open the Farmingdale State Invitational on the Red Course at Bethpage State Park, while Poon fired a career-best 4-under 66 the same day last April. 

 JONES TAKES OVER FOR PAGE
•    Following a successful three-year stint as an assistant coach at Denison, Alexander Jones was hired to succeed Jeff Page as the Beavers' new head men's and women's golf coach back in July. 
•    In addition to helping the women's program make three NCAA Championship appearances, the Big Red moved up nearly 30 spots in the Scoreboard Division III rankings while improving the team's adjusted scoring average in each of his three seasons on staff. 
•    A 2014 graduate of Methodist, Jones returned to his alma mater as the PGA Head Golf Professional and Director of Instruction for the PGA Golf Management Program in 2019 and served as a volunteer assistant for the Monarchs' men's golf program, which won a Division III national championship in 2022.
•    Page, who led the Beavers to six NCAA Championship appearances and was selected as regional coach of the year five times, will serve as an assist for the Green and White this season. 

ABOUT THE FIELD
•    Including Babson, seven of the 17 teams in the Gate City Invitational Field are ranked in the Golfweek Bushnell Division III preseason poll, highlighted by No. 2 Huntingdon, fifth-ranked Methodist and No. 9 Kenyon. 
•    Oglethorpe (No. 12), Lynchburg (No. 20) and Guilford (No. 21) are among the ranked teams in the tournament field along with five other programs that were receiving votes in the preseason poll. 

NUMBERS TO KNOW
•    Babson played in six 54-hole events last season and finished with a score of 877 or better three times, which includes winning the Williams Invitational at 22-over 874 and playing 10th at the Jekyll Island Collegiate Invitational with a 13-under 851. 
•    The average score over three rounds at last year's Gate City Invitational was 75.11 and Sewanee posted a 54-hole score of 3-under 861 to edge Carnegie Mellon by one stroke and Huntingdon by two shots. 
•    Both Berry, who owns a 74.82 average in 49 rounds, and Vantipalli, 73.49 average in 47 rounds, will surpass 50 career starts at the Gate City Invitational. 

UP NEXT
•    The Beavers return to New England to defend their title at the Williams Invitational on September 19-20 at Taconic Golf Club.