Oct. 20, 2003

Cape Girardeau, Mo. - After day one of the 2003 SMS Pepsi Challenge at Highland Springs Country Club in Springfield, Mo., Southeast Missouri State golf finds themselves in a bit of a rut, as the team currently holds 11th place out of 13 teams after two rounds of play.

Oklahoma City University, the only school in the field Southeast hasn't faced up until today's rounds, is the first place team going into the third and final round on Tuesday. School rival Murray State is in second and the host school, Southwest Missouri State, rounds out the top three cumulative finishes of the day.

Matt Hillis is currently the individual leader for Southeast. Hillis played two good rounds of golf to finish at eight over par, and is tied for 13th place overall, along with three other golfers. Both Murray and Southwest each have four golfers in the top 17 places out of 74 golfers after day one. Host school SMS has all six of their golfers in the top 17 heading into tomorrow.

Two golfers shot under par over the two rounds. Brian Norman of Southern Illinois finished at three under and Northern Illinois' Nicholas Schenk shot one stroke worse for a two under. There are two golfers tied for third place going into the final round. Nicolas Allain of Oklahoma City and Jared Pyatt of SMS are each one over up to this point.

Besides Murray State, Tennessee-Martin is the only other Ohio Valley Conference team entered into the tournament. Southeast is ahead of their team totals as the Skyhawks of Tennessee-Martin occupy last place at the Challenge thus far.

Southeast will look to move up on the leader board and stay ahead of Tennessee-Martin when action resumes tomorrow morning.