Luka Naglic shoots four-over on first day of NCAA Regional

Arkansas State senior Luka Naglic began play Monday at the NCAA Regional golf tournament at the Auburn University Club, shooting a first-round 76 to place him tied for 42nd among 75 players.

One of nine individuals selected to compete in the regional, Naglic ended the 54-hole tournament’s opening day two strokes behind eight players tied for 26th. The low five teams and the low individual not on those teams will advance to the finals.

Naglic will enter Tuesday’s second round six strokes behind Kentucky’s Alex Goff (-1), the highest individual not on one of the top five teams in the current standings after the opening round. Chattanooga (-5) sits atop the leaderboard, followed by Colorado State (-3) in second and Auburn (+4) and TCU (+4) are tied for third. Vanderbilt (+6) and Ohio State (+6) are tied for fifth.

Naglic birdied two holes, the par-5 third and the par-5 16th, and made 10 pars, but bogeyed six holes, three on the front nine and three on the back nine.

The Zirovnica, Slovenia, native is the sixth A-State men’s golfer to ever compete as an individual at an NCAA Regional. Naglic is the first individual qualifier since Tanner Napier at the 2018 NCAA Regional hosted by Oklahoma. Zan Luka Stirn (2017), Lloyd du Preez (2010) and Zoltan Veress (1998, 1999) also participated in NCAA Regionals as qualifiers.

Round two of the NCAA Regional in Auburn will begin at 8:00 a.m. Tuesday, and Naglic is set to tee off on hole one at 10:12 a.m. Live results at the event are available on Golfstat.com