AUGUSTA, Ga. – The Fighting Illini men's golf team is in fourth place after a solid team effort on Day 1 of the Augusta Haskins Award Invitational at Forest Hills Golf Club. The Illini opened with a 287, but carded a team season-low of 278 in Round 2 to jump to 11-under heading into Sunday's final round. Senior Tommy Kuhl (T5) and sophomore Piercen Hunt (T13) led the way for the Illini on Day 1, giving the Orange and Blue a foundation with two top-15 scores at the 36-hole mark.

Kuhl opened with a 1-under 71 in Round 1 before finding his stride in the afternoon en route to a career-low mark of 7-under 65 in Round 2. Kuhl's 65 – which included seven birdies and an eagle to offset a pair of bogeys – tied for the lowest round of the day and improved his own personal-best mark by three strokes.

Overall, Kuhl is 8-under and in the hunt for the individual title sitting three shots of the pace of Texas' brother duo of Pierceson and Parker Coody who each shot 11-under on Day 1.

Hunt sits two strokes outside of the top 10 after carding back-to-back rounds of 70. The sophomore was bogey-free with two birdies Round 1. He then carded an eagle of his own in Round 2, and added three more birdies to offset a trio of bogey's to finish 4-under for the day.

After teeing off on No. 5 to open the day, Adrien Dumont de Chassart, the No. 7-ranked player in the country in the latest Golfstat rankings quickly found himself in trouble at 6-over through his first five holes. The senior remained focused, however, and continued to battle back throughout the rest of Round 1 and into Round 2, shooting a combined 5-under over the remaining 31 holes to move to 1-over with 18 holes to play.

Freshman Jackson Buchanan carded 72-74 to close his day just one stroke of Dumont de Chassart's pace in a tie for 34^th, while junior Jerry Ji (+3) is tied for 40^th, one stroke behind Buchanan.

No. 12-ranked Texas sits alone atop the team leaderboard with a two-round total of 538 (-38). No. 2 Oklahoma State (-22) and No. 13 Notre Dame (-15) sit just ahead of the 24^th-ranked Illini.

Round 3 is set to begin with tee times on Sunday at 8:30 a.m. ET/7:30 a.m. CT. The Illini, paired with South Carolina (-8) and Northwestern (-8), are set to begin off No. 1 as part of the second groupings on the course starting at 9:15 a.m. ET/8:15 a.m. CT. Live scoring is available throughout the final round on Golfstat.com.

FOLLOW THE #ILLINI
For more Fighting Illini men's golf news, stay tuned to FightingIllini.com and follow @IlliniMGolf on social media: Twitter | Instagram | Facebook.