Despite tallying the fourth-best overall score of Sunday's third round of the Florida Atlantic University Spring Break Championship, the Marquette men's golf team couldn't overcome two poor performances on Friday and Saturday and settled for an 11th-place finish.

"It was disappointing," coach Tim Grogan said. "Each event we go into we're preparing for the top spot. That's what we prepare for, and that's what our mindset is. We just got off to a very poor start."

Aside from senior Dustin Schwab's 4-under 67 on Friday, there weren't many highlights in the first two days of the tournament, which was held at the Gleneagles Country Club in Delray Beach, Fla. The team shot a combined 23-over-par 298 on Friday before a brutal 43-over 311 team total Saturday in which the Golden Eagles had more double bogeys or over (six) than birdies (five).

"It was pretty much the low point of the season so far," Schwab said. "It kind of came out of nowhere. We were all playing somewhat decent coming in."

Thanks to an enormous turnaround Sunday, Marquette was able to come out of the weekend on a positive note. The Golden Eagles fired a 6-over 285 in the final round, led by Mike Van Sickle's low-round of 65.

Unfortunately for Marquette, Van Sickle (who finished tied for 22nd) was not his usual self before Sunday. He shot a team-high 9-over 80 on Friday, and then followed it up with a 3-over 74 on Saturday. Van Sickle admitted he was playing a little out of character in the first two rounds.

"I was a little tentative with my swing at times, and things got out of hand," he said. "I had a couple bad swings and a couple missed putts. I was almost in a daze, like 'What's going on?' In the last round, I just focused on more normal shots and hitting more club and trying to play the wind."

Schwab said the team tried not to concentrate too hard on making up for its leader's struggles.

"We all know what we need to do," he said. "We never expect him to play bad, but everybody does — it's golf.

"You have to be mentally prepared to play for yourself, and if everybody plays well then the teams going to come out good."

Schwab came in as Marquette's second finisher, firing a three-day total of 8-over 221 to earn him a tie for 27th. Ben Sieg showed the most consistency of any Golden Eagle throughout the tournament, firing 75, 76 and 74 in taking home a tie for 52nd. Kelly Kretz shot an even-par 71 on the final day and finished 72nd.

Grogan was pleased by Sunday's performances but said he would like to see more consistency from round-to-round.

"Our focus has to be there," Grogan said. "Any time you're in a slump, you don't try to reinvent the wheel. If we look at bits and pieces throughout the spring, there have been a lot of positives. It's 'Can we string those together?'"