Tthe ISU men’s golf team is heading to Hutchinson, Kan. this week for this year’s Big 12 Championships, one of the most competitive conference tournaments in the NCAAs.

The regular season is over, and unless the Cyclones manage to shock the collegiate golf world and win the Big 12, this will also be the end of their season.

“A lot of the guys chose to come to Iowa State to play in the Big 12 Conference,” said assistant coach Patrick Datz. “This is where they get what they signed up for.”

Last week at the Hawkeye Invitational, the team faced seemingly challenging Big 12 schools in Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska and Kansas State. Unfortunately for the Cyclones, those four schools were toward the bottom half of the Big 12.

At this week’s meet, the Cyclones will be taking on the feared Big 12 conference in its entirety.

The Cyclones will not only be facing No. 6 Texas A&M, No. 11 Texas, No. 15 Texas Tech and No. 26 Oklahoma, they will also be taking on No. 1 ranked – and this year’s favorite – Oklahoma State.

Oklahoma State is led by its outstanding No. 1 individual Peter Uihlein. Just last week Uihlein played at the prestigious Masters in Augusta.

“As a coach, we tell them to focus on the present, on not worry about what they can’t control, like who they play or the weather,” Datz said. “The more they’re aware of it, the more they know they should just be focusing on how they play themselves.”

Over the past few tournaments, the results have been less than pleasing. Since the golfers set the record for 54-hole performance at the Desert Shootout, they’ve been on a downhill slide, and haven’t finished in the top half of the field in any of their last four tournaments.

At the Big 12 meet, the teams will be competing at the highly-touted Prairie Dunes Country Club. Four of the five Cyclones playing have experience at the golf course including Nathan Leary, Nate McCoy, Michael Wuertz and Tom Lathrop.

“We heard a lot of talk at the beginning of the spring semester about how Prarie Dunes is a hard golf course,” Datz said. “I think if the guys can go through the whole week and have positive attitudes, we can be successful.”

The golfers know they have a lot of mental preparation for the meet, and they also know they have to go in with an winning attitude.

“This year we have to realize that our mentality is the most important thing going into this,”  McCoy said. “Attitude affects your entire game, and that’s what we need to change.”