With less than one month remaining before the Big 12 Championships, the ISU men’s golf team begins its preparations Monday in Wichita, Kan., at the Diet Pepsi Shocker Invitational.

Coach Jay Horton said he hopes the Cyclones can continue the progress they’ve made thus far and climb up the leaderboard.

“We’ve been able to do something better each tournament, so, hopefully, we can keep building on that,” Horton said.

Although the team has improved in some way every time out, Horton said — as he has all season — the Cyclones need to become more consistent during an entire tournament.

“We’ve been playing better and our scores have been getting lower, but we’re not close to the top of the leaderboard yet,” Horton said. “It takes more than one guy playing well to get us up there.

“We have good rounds here and there, but we’re not consistent throughout the tournament.”

One of the ways the team has said they are trying to improve consistency is with better focus. Junior Drew Dalziel shot the low round of the tournament for Iowa State with a second-round 69 two weeks ago at the Stevinson Ranch Invitational and chalked it up to improved focus.

“There’s just a lot of little things I can do to get better,” Dalziel said. “I’ve been trying to take it just one shot at a time during the tournaments, and I think that helps a lot.

“Now I just need to take the 78s and turn them into 75s, and turn the 75s into even par.”

Horton also said he believes once the team realizes it simply needs to play with confidence, its scores will come down.

“They’re realizing it’s not so much talent as it is mental and how you prepare yourself,” Horton said. “We just need to learn how to make our bad scores better.”

The Cyclones have been led this spring by stellar play from a few freshmen and through the improvement of the rest of the team, neither of which is surprising to Horton.

“I don’t think any of it is surprising because I knew they all can play,” Horton said. “[Chris] Baker’s been solid for us, and he’s been a leader on and off the golf course. Joe Cermak’s coming along and playing well right now too.”

Cermak led the Cyclones at the Stevinson Ranch Invitational. It was the first time he has carded the low score for Iowa State and the first time this spring Baker did not lead the Cyclones.

“Everyone’s been getting better in some way so far,” Horton said. “Now we just need to sustain it.”