The ISU men’s golf team completed their fall golf season Tuesday in the warmth of Waco, Texas. The Cyclones ended the Henry Griffiths Invitational with a 14th-place finish at 878.

Taking the team title were the hosts from Baylor, who shot a team score of 268 in the third round to run away with the championship. Lamar, who shared a piece of the lead after 36 holes, wound up 12 strokes behind the Bears for a distant runner-up finish. New Mexico made up ground and completed their tournament in third place.

Jeremy Lyons tied for the best Cyclone score with Greg Stephanson. Both ended with 216 and tied for 31st position. Corey Schultz was the next best player for the Cyclones with 228 over three rounds. Kevin Oswald shot 230 for the tournament, and Chad Kovaleski ended the scoring with 234.

Lamar’s Chris Stroud fought back in the third round and won the medalist honor in a playoff over Adam Meyer of Baylor. Meyer’s teammate, Jamie McLeary, was the second of three Bears to finish in the top 10. McLeary was two strokes behind the playoff, which landed him in third.

The Cyclones were attempting to have another good performance to back up their team title at the Big 4 Championship two weeks ago. However, the squad didn’t get off to a good start, posting the second worst score of the first round.

“I was very disappointed with the way we ended the season,” ISU coach Jay Horton said. “Our intentions are not to go down there and finish in the bottom of the pack with these teams. We know that we can play with them.”

Stephanson also knew that this performance wasn’t the best effort by the Cyclones.

“I know from my angle, I played one decent round,” he said. “I wasn’t happy with my first two rounds. I could have played six shots lower.”

The tournament ended a season that was filled with highs and lows. Included in the better portion of the season were the performances of Lyons and Stephanson, who averaged 72.6 and 73.5 strokes per round.

Stephanson said his performance has improved through lots of hard work.

“I had a terrible year last year, and I made a promise to myself that I would work on my game over the summer,” Stephanson said. “I came out [this fall] with a desire and a confidence in my game.”

Another positive was the first tournament win during the tenure of Horton. That came two weeks ago.

“Winning a tournament was something that hadn’t been done while I’ve been here, so it was a confidence builder for the guys,” Horton said.

One of the things stressed to be worked on during the offseason was the quality of play throughout the whole team.

“We’re looking for consistency from all the guys,” Stephanson said. “We need to get rid of the rounds in the ’80s.”

“It seems like we always have someone that is near the bottom of the field at every tournament,” Horton said. “We need to get to the point where we have five good scores [per round]. We can’t rely on having four good scorers and throwing out the fifth one.”

Even though the fall season didn’t end the way the ISU players wanted it to, they can take out some positives as they focus on their offseason workouts.

“We’re all happy with finishing first [at the Big 4], but we’re not happy with our last tournament. We think we’re a much better team than we finished. I’m looking forward to the team having a great Spring semester of golf.”

The Cyclones will now get ready for the spring season, starting with the Southwest Texas Invitational on February 18.