UAPB claims conference golf title

Freshman medalist Ismael Garcia (left) and medalist Patrick Mwendapole (right) helped the UAPB men's golf team win the SWAC championship this week in Flowood, Miss. Standing in the middle is head coach Roger Totten. (Pine Bluff Commercial/I.C. Murrell)
Freshman medalist Ismael Garcia (left) and medalist Patrick Mwendapole (right) helped the UAPB men's golf team win the SWAC championship this week in Flowood, Miss. Standing in the middle is head coach Roger Totten. (Pine Bluff Commercial/I.C. Murrell)

The University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff men's golfers proved how Patrick Mwendapole felt about the team for more than a year.

"It wasn't the greatest feeling being the runners-up to Texas Southern when we knew we had the better team," Mwendapole said about his thinking after the Golden Lions settled for the Southwestern Athletic Conference runner-up trophy last spring. "We just felt like we had a better team and a better connection this year. So, that was the motivation. We knew we could do it."

They did this week, taking home the championship for the first time in program history.

Not only did UAPB win the SWAC tournament at Flowood, Miss., by 29 strokes as a team in wire-to-wire fashion. The Lions also were the only team to shoot under par for the 54-hole tournament, turning in a 2-under 862. Mwendapole won the low medalist honor, or the individual championship, after shooting 7-under 209 (68-69-72) on The Refuge course to lead a UAPB sweep of the top three places.

Ismael Garcia, the runner-up, earned freshman medalist after going 1-under 215, and Li Su moved up two spots to third in the final round after turning in a second straight even-par 72 to finish the tournament 1-over.

Also for UAPB, Angel Perez tied for eighth place at 6-over and Jaime Moliner tied for 12th after shooting 8-over. Both are from Spain.

For their top-five finishes, Mwendapole, Garcia and Su all made the All-SWAC first team. Perez was placed on the second team.

Mwendapole, from Lusaka, Zambia, has played consistently at UAPB after transferring from New Mexico Military Institute in the fall of 2021. He is one of five foreigners on the seven-man Lions team. He was second-team All-SWAC last year, when he shot 5-over 221 at The Refuge.

"I knew I could play a lot better than shooting 70," Mwendapole said, recalling his lowest single-round score a year ago. "There was a lot of commitment to every shot I hit this year and lot more trust in myself than there was last year."

Garcia, of Leon, Mexico, went 69-72-74 on his first time to play in Flowood.

"It's a great experience for me," he said. "It's a really nice way for me to finish my freshman season here, and I'm just hoping to have better rounds in the next couple tournaments."

Roger Totten, the Lions' sixth-year head coach and senior executive athletic director, points the team's success to leadership.

"One of our goals coming back this year was that we did not want to feel the same way [we did in 2022]," he said. "We made some tough decisions. We brought in three guys that we felt could help those two guys win [Mwendapole and Garcia], and it worked out. We brought in three guys we felt could fit in with their personalities, and it worked."

Kohlin Hicks of Kansas City, Mo., Jared Charbonneau of Eugene, Ore., and Moliner also returned to the UAPB roster from last season. Su, of Melbourne, Australia, Perez and Garcia were the three additions who gave the Lions a boost.

The team racked up wins in the SWAC Fall Invitational, Alabama State Spring Invite and Gulf Shores Invite, but it was a "hard conversation" three weeks ago where the players and coaching staff shared their thoughts about how to win the conference.

"I think we both wanted the same thing, which was to win the conference championship," Totten said. "We knew what was best for each other. One thing about this team is, it's about 'team,' not Coach Totten, not Patrick, not Ismael. It's about a team concept."

UAPB will have at least one more tournament to wrap up the season, and that's in one of six NCAA regional events. Selections for the regionals will be May 3, with the national championships scheduled for May 26-31 in Scottsdale, Ariz.

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