PARADISE ISLANDS, The Bahamas – Jacksonville University men's golf started off the White Sands Invitational on Friday, shooting a 288 to sit in a tie for fifth after the first round at the Ocean Club Golf Course.
 
On a sunny day in the Caribbean with the wind blowing up to 20 miles per hour, the Dolphins were led by Grant Haefner, whose first round 70 has him in a tie for fourth on the leaderboard.
 
Haefner got his day started the right way, sinking a birdie on his first hole and setting the tone for a remarkably consistent round. After giving a stroke back on his fifth hole, he made eight consecutive pars and closed his round with two birdies in his last five holes to finish 2-under and in a seven-way tie for fourth.
 
Joseph Sullivan rode an up-and-down start, before settling in later in the round. He bogeyed two and birdied the other three of his first five holes. He also birdied his seventh to get to 2-under and made six straight pars before his only blemish on the back-nine, a double bogey. Four more pars ended his round at even par 72, and he is tied for 23rd.
 
Alexandre Vandermoten hit a pair of birdies consecutively on holes five and six, bounced back from two bogeys with two-straight birdies again on his 13th and 14th holes of the round, but double bogeyed his last hole of the day to enter the clubhouse T28 after a 1-over 73.
 
Filip Raza matched his teammate Vandermoten's first round score, hitting four total birdies, three on the front nine and one more on the back. Josef Hacker made three birdies on the day as well.
 
The team was tied for the best in the field on Par-5s, shooting 10-under collectively. The Dolphins sank 55 pars and 18 birdies in total. Haefner shot 1-under on Par-4s, while Raza led the team with a 3-under score on Par-5s, followed by Vandermoten, Sullivan and Hacker's 2-under and Haefner's 1-under.
 
Round two gets started at 8 a.m. Saturday morning with a shotgun start.