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PROVO — The BYU women’s golf team advanced to the NCAA women’s championships for the first time since 2007 with a sixth-place finish in the Baton Rouge Regional last week.
A solid accomplishment, except for one minor detail: the NCAA plays the final rounds May 20-25, a six-day event that includes one round on Sunday, May 22.
BYU’s affiliation with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints prevents Sunday play in all sports for religious reasons, and the NCAA has added Bylaw 31.1.3.1 to respond to religious schools such as BYU to let them participate in NCAA championships if such schools are made eligible.
As such, the college sports’ governing body announced a solution Monday. Each school has one practice round generally played the Thursday prior to the 54-hole stroke play tournament Friday-Sunday. That round will also include a scoring round for BYU.
“To accommodate Brigham Young’s policy of not competing on Sunday, the school will have the option to participate in the practice round on Thursday with the other 132 participants (24 teams and 12 individuals),” the NCAA’s statement read. “Brigham Young will then begin their first round of play (with Sunday hole locations) on Thursday afternoon following the practice round.
“All 24 teams and 12 individuals will play Friday and Saturday while on Sunday, the other 23 teams and 12 individuals will finish their final rounds.”
BYU’s golfers will compete alone Thursday at Eugene Country Club in Oregon, but other school’s coaches and student-athletes will be permitted to return to the course as spectators.
A similar exemption could likely be made for the NCAA men’s golf championships this year, as well. BYU failed to earn a team bid to an NCAA regional, but men’s golfer Patrick Fishburn qualified for the Albuquerque Regional as an individual, contested May 16-18. If the sophomore qualifies through to the championship round May 27-June 1, this exemption would provide him an avenue to compete while maintaining BYU’s standards of no Sunday play as well.
NCAA bylaws allow such exemptions in competition provided schools file for an exception before Sept. 1 of the relevant calendar year, an exception BYU and other officials at certain religious schools regularly file.
“Our women’s golf team has enjoyed an outstanding year and are very excited to participate in the 2016 Division I women’s golf championship in Eugene, Oregon,” BYU associate athletic director Duff Tittle told the Deseret News’ Dick Harmon. “We’re grateful to the NCAA for providing an exception that allows our team to participate in the golf championship with competing on Sunday.”
BYU won the West Coast Conference title last month, its first women’s golf championship since the 1992 Western Athletic Conference title. The schedule of the NCAA Championships is determined by media partner The Golf Channel, which plans for a tournament to be broadcast Friday through Tuesday so as to accommodate its professional golf broadcasts as well.
