The St. Thomas men’s golf team tallied six birdies on the final two holes to beat Gustavus by one stroke at the St. John’s Spring Invite this weekend in St. Cloud and Monticello.

The Tommies beat 11 other teams, including eight MIAC teams, Wisconsin-Eau Claire and Wisconsin-Stout. The team won many tournaments in the final round this season, and senior Alex Kapraun said that speaks to the team’s effort and determination to do what it takes to win.

“Like this weekend, we haven’t always gotten off to really good starts in our tournaments,” Kapraun said. “I think we were down going into the final round of each of the tournaments that we won. That just speaks to our guys never giving up.”

St. John’s took third place in the tournament and finished three shots behind St. Thomas. Kapraun said the exciting final round made the win even better.

“We were in the clubhouse waiting for the final groups to come in, and we were all watching the scores come in online,” Kapraun said. “We knew it was close, so we were nervous, but luckily (junior Jack Riester) birdied his last two holes.”

Along with the team’s win, Riester took first overall in the tournament, also by one shot.

“It was a fun tournament and a fun weekend,” Riester said. “I think we’ve all been doing so well because we know we need to believe in ourselves and know we can do it.”

The St. John’s Spring Invite ended St. Thomas’ regular season. Although the Tommies didn’t win the MIAC championship and failed to receive the automatic bid to the NCAA championships, Kapraun said there is still hope that their season isn’t over yet.

“We didn’t win the conference, so we don’t get the automatic bid, but there is an at-large bid,” Kapraun said. “So since we’re a better team and we just won this tournament, we think there’s a pretty good chance we can still make it to nationals.”

The bid is determined by a national selection committee, which meets on Monday next week. The Tommies will find out Tuesday whether or not they received the bid.

Riester said the Tommies are confident with their performance this season and agreed the team thinks it will get the bid.

“We’re very confident,” Riester said. “Right now we are one of the top teams in the nation, and I think there are a lot of guys on the team who deserve another chance to play this season.”

Kapraun is one of four seniors on the team along with Alex Gabriel, Pat Larkin and Bennett Schroeder. He hopes each of them will get one more opportunity to compete for St. Thomas.

“We really hope we get to nationals,” Kapraun said. “It’s been a fun season there are three seniors that placed in the top five this weekend. We had a great time and hope that this isn’t the end quite yet.”

Lauren Andrego can be reached at andr0090@stthomas.edu.