Brian Kortan & Co. gearing up for next week's SEC Championships

The regular season has come and gone as Texas A&M's men's golf team prepares for the SEC Championship tournament, which begins next Tuesday at Sea Island Golf Club. On Thursday morning, head coach Brian Kortan joined TexAgs Radio to provide an update on his program.

Key notes from Brian Kortan interview

• The spring sports, and the sports in general at A&M, are incredible in terms of wins and coaches. I’m fortunate to be part of it. Mike Elko has come in and set the bar of acknowledging it. Jim Schlossnagle and Trisha Ford have been awesome. These athletes continue to perform, and it’s just awesome to see.
   
• All of these coaches are motivated to be No. 1. My counterpart across the hall is Gerrod Chadwell, and they made a great run at the SEC Championships. They have a great team and a team built for the postseason.
   
• I like who we are and our identity. It’s fun to play the regular-season stuff, but the postseason is a different animal. We’re getting into the heat of the battle, and I have guys with experience. I have three guys that have won golf tournaments recently. I like where we’re at right now.
   
• Playing at your home venue can go a couple of different ways sometimes. The weather was tough, and Baylor played good golf that day. In general, we could have handled some things a little bit better, but we played better on the last day. Jaime Montojo won the golf tournament, and Phichaksn Maichon was right there with him. We just didn’t ham-and-egg it in other parts. Daniel Rodrigues was nursing a back injury, and he hadn’t played golf in a week. I love getting trophies, but I hate handing them out.
   
• Montojo has been trending this whole semester toward getting all facets of his game in the condition he wants them to be. He’s close to that. He’s working his tail off, and he’s getting better at listening and taking coaching. He’s a calm guy who wants to win. To see him win was pretty cool.
   
• Maichon played well, but the putter was not his best friend. To see guys finish first and third and knowing guys are close to being in the same conversation is great.
   
• Aaron Pounds did a nice job. He has put in a lot of great work this semester. He has settled in. What he does is good enough to be a really good college player, and as he grows from there, that will give him a chance to do some special things. Right now, he can be competitive and help us down the stretch.
   
• Our golf course is hard, and we caught it on a really windy weekend. Some coaches say they love coming here because it’s so hard and hate coming here because it’s so hard. It’s a challenging spot, especially when the wind gets blowing. Traditions Club is visually intimidating, but in reality, it’s pretty wide. Until you’ve played it a bunch to get comfortable, it can be a tough place to play.
   
• In the past, we’ve had some really great fields here, and some coaches believe Traditions prepares them for the postseason.
   
• Health? Heck, they’re good. We have a nice break here. We will head to the SEC Championships on Monday, so they’ll rest up and focus on their schoolwork.
   
• There are some guys who will be at the facility every day, but you might not be grinding for two or three hours straight. They watched the Masters all weekend on the couch. That’s a nice break for them. We work out in the gym three days a week. They hit the balls and putts they need to hit. The intensity is dialed down a bit, so being a college kid for a few days helps them decompress.
   
• In the SEC Tournament, you have to handle the stroke play to get to match play, and people say that anything can happen in match play. You have to play some great golf to get through stroke play. Our goal is to always battle through stroke play to get there because I like our chances in matches. We’re like the eighth- or ninth-highest-ranked SEC team. We have a conference of champions. It’s a deep conference in terms of skill and talent. I like that we’re in there. That’s what our guys want to play for. They want those challenges. We have those challenges, and you’ll add two more next year in Oklahoma and Texas.
   
• I’ve got some guys who have won some serious matches, and they’ve been there a lot. In general, our guys love to compete. We have a competitive group led by Rodrigues, who is the most competitive guy I’ve been around in a while.