ORLANDO – Former UCF Men's Golf standout Ricardo Gouveia secured second place on the Challenge Tour Order of Merit on Monday after finishing the Rolex Challenge Tour Grand Final with a 7-under 277 score, good for second place.
With the second-place finish on the Challenge Tour Order of Merit, Gouveia earned a full European Tour Card, marking his return to the European Tour. The 30-year-old Goueveia finished with a 67-74-67-69=277(-7) score.
Goueveia has been dominant to this point in 2021. In July and August, he won back-to-back Challenge Tour events in the Italian Challenge and Euram Bank Open. His last win prior to that came at the 2015 Challenge Tour Grand Final in Oman, a win which secured him the prestigious title of Challenge Tour Number One for that season.
A real star on the Challenge Tour, the Portuguese won twice in 2015 en route to finishing top of the Rankings and winning a record €251,592. His rookie season on the European Tour suggested he was set to establish himself as he finished 54th on the Race to Dubai Rankings in Partnership with Rolex but he would finish outside the top 100 in 2017 and 2018 before losing his card after four seasons on Tour. A pair of victories and six more top ten finishes in 2021 saw him finish second on the Road to Mallorca. The former Knight will look to take another leap forward in 2022.
While at UCF from 2011-14, Gouveia was third-team All-America and All-Region as a senior, while earning Honorable Mention All-America honors as a sophomore. Gouveia is sprinkled throughout the men's golf record book as one of the top golfers in program history. Heholds the second best 54-hole score with a 203, holds the second lowest career scoring average (71.84), and has the second best single-season scoring average with a 71.06. In his three seasons as a Knight, Gouveia won an event each year.