M. Golf hopes for aces at Atlantic City

The Penn men's golf team has finished higher than every Ivy League school it faced over the last two weeks. Now the Quakers are out to prove they can do the same when the stakes are higher at Atlantic City Country Club this weekend.

Today through Sunday the course in Northfield, N.J., will host the 2009 Ivy League Championships. The Quakers are among five teams that have a chance at the title, according to Penn coach Scott Allen.

"I'm very confident in our chances," he said. "I think we're [deeper] and more consistent than any of [the] five teams."

Adding to Penn's confidence is its performance over the last two weeks at the Princeton Invitational and Caves Valley Intercollegiate. At Princeton the team finished behind Yale but higher than Harvard. The results flip-flopped at Caves Valley, where the Quakers finished second to the Crimson but came in ahead of the Bulldogs. Both times the Red and Blue finished third, improving their record to 43-7 (they've only finished behind seven teams in their four tournaments combined).

"We've been in contention every week [so] they've had that feeling of being in the hunt and trying to do what they have to do to win," Allen said.

Also in the hunt will be the four other contenders he listed: Princeton, winner of six championships this decade, last year's champion Columbia and the two Ivies that topped Penn over the last two events. Penn last won the 54-hole championship event in April 2007.

In a talent-laden field, the Quakers know they need to be at their best this weekend.

"It's the basis of how we determine success for our season so it can be a lot of pressure," senior Brett Rendina said.

Allen put it even more simply: "It's what we're here for."

But the biggest question mark heading into the spring was filling the void of the injured Mike Blodgett, Penn's first-ever Ivy League individual champion last year. Despite hope that he would return by now, the senior captain will be out with a chronic shoulder injury. Even so, Blodgett is still leading the team.

"I can't imagine anyone could possibly have dealt with this situation any better than he has," Allen said. "He comes to every practice [and] he supports the guys. He's almost like another coach right now."

With Blodgett hurt, Rendina has handled the task of replacing him. The Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., native boasts two top-ten finishes, including a tie for first at the Rehoboth Beach Invitational. But perhaps his most impressive feat occurred last week at Caves Valley, when he turned himself in after realizing he had made a scorecard error.

"It showed the kind of guys we have on this team," Allen said. "Hopefully it'll give us a little bit of good golf karma going into [this weekend]."