This year’s golf team has performed a complete turnaround from last season. In only its second season of existence, the Point Park University’s men’s golf team has won two tournaments and finished in the top six in all five tournaments in which they have competed.Head Coach Gabe Bubon says the success of his team so far in these tournaments can be attributed to the talented and hard working young players.The Pioneers are led by freshman James Daley and sophomore Austin Elder. Junior Alejandro Bernardini, senior Brad Frank and freshman Michael Caris have also contributed with strong and consistent seasons so far but every member of the team has had an excellent start to his golf season. “All my new guys are strong players and have very good potential,” Bubon said. “Daley has been excellent for us. He has won two tournaments already. To be a freshman and win two tournaments is exceptional.” No player has been more consistent for the Pioneers than Elder. He has finished second in every tournament so far this season except the Kuhn Invitational at Allegheny College in which he finished fifth. He tied Daley in the Grove City Invitational but lost by one stroke to the freshman in a tiebreaker.”I feel like I’m playing my best golf right now. It kind of stinks that our season is over now until the spring,” Elder said.Coach Bubon is happy with the results he has seen compared to last year and he is very excited about the future of the team.”I’m very happy. [The team] has only been around about one year and five months,” Bubon said. “To win two tournaments already is great. We are very pleased with the progress we’ve seen. We struggled last year and for the team to be much improved this year says a lot about the team.”The main problem with the team’s first season was a lack of talent and time to recruit golfers for the inaugural season.”The main thing is [between last year and this year] is that Coach Bubon had a full year to recruit golfers,” said Kevin Taylor, director of athletic communications. “Point Park introduced golf teams in June of 2009. He only had 6 weeks to recruit for the first season. With a full year of recruiting [this year] it shows. This is a young, talented team. There is a golf resurgence here at Point Park.”Elder could not be happier with his team’s start and his own performance during the offseason tournaments.”I couldn’t ask for more. Last year we shot higher. This year, our top five guys are all shooting much better rounds,” Elder said. “There is a lot of competition in practice so it makes it more fun and it pushes us to be better.”The team recently won the Grove City Invitational, coming in first place out of eight teams and finishing with the top two golfers in Daley and Elder, but Bubon says the team’s best performance was actually the Mercyhurst Invitational against superior competition.”Mercyhurst was our best tournament so far because we were playing against [NCAA] Division 2 schools,” Bubon said. “I wasn’t sure how those guys would do but I was very proud of these guys. Most of those schools we thought were at our level or higher so we were very happy with our showing.”Elder finished second in the Mercyhurst Invitational to Derek Baker of Indiana University of Pennsylvania in what turned out to be a career best weekend of golf for Elder.”It was the best round I’ve ever shot in my entire life,” Elder said. “I lost by one stroke.”While Bubon likes the talent he has assembled, he is more excited about the work ethic and dedication of his golfers.”We have some young talent but even more than that we have a team with a great work ethic,” Bubon said. “Everyone wants to practice and to get better and that will only make the team even better than talent alone.”The team is talented and very young which could allow Point Park golf to make a name for themselves not only in the American Mideast Conference but in the entire National Association of Intercollegiate Atheltics.”This team is mostly all freshmen and sophomores so I can see these guys being very successful, not only [at] a local level but a national level as well,” Bubon said. “I think in two years or so you will see these guys in the national tournament. They have the potential to be very deadly.”