It’s a yearly tradition that has spanned the last eleven seasons for the Fighting Illini Men’s Golf team, and it has been the lone shimmering beacon of hope in what has been a dark wasteland of frustratingly burdensome sporting events that fans of the University of Illinois athletic program have had to endure.
I’m speaking (of course) of an NCAA Tournament birth in the Men’s Golf National Championship event, played yearly at the end of May.
Since 2008, Head Coach Mike Small and the Illini have found a way to turn a program north of the Mason-Dixon Line into a national powerhouse in the game of golf.