FORT MYERS, Fla. – Headlined by former UCF standout Connor Arendell winning the title, four current/former Knights men’s golfers shined at the 77th Florida Open Championship held at The Golf Club at Crown Colony this week.
Arendell, who competed for the Knights from 2009-11, shot a 13-under-par 200 in the three-round event to win the championship for the second time in the last three years, as he also claimed the crown in 2021.
UCF senior Egor Eroshenko competed in the event as an amateur and fired a 210 (-3) to tie for 21st, recording the third-best score among amateurs in the field. Nicholas Estrada, who will be a redshirt sophomore for the Knights during the 2023-24 athletics season, shot a three-over-par 216 and former Knight Brad Schneider carded a 148 (+6) following the first two rounds.
Arendell opened the event by firing a 66 (-5) in the first round, highlighted by seven birdies with one on each of the first three holes. He followed that showing with a nine-under 62 on Saturday, dropping in nine birdies in a bogey-free round.
The Cape Coral, Florida, native closed out the championship with a 72 (+1) on Sunday to finish the weekend -13 to win the title by two strokes over Andrew Pope and Kevin Aylwin, who tied for second at -11.
"It's an honor to win this championship again," Arendell said following the event to the Florida State Golf Assocation (FSGA). "Winning down here two years ago in Fort Myers gave me some extra confidence coming into the week. There are a lot of chances out there if you hit the fairways, so I just knew if I could hit some fairways then I would have some looks and go from there. I had that double early on, but settled in after that."
This is the second Florida Open victory for Arendell, who won the 2021 Florida Open at Fiddlesticks Country Club. He becomes just the 11th player to win two Florida Open title and the first player to win a second title since JC Deacon in 2020 at Pine Tree Golf Club.