LA QUINTA, Calif. -- In the final tournament of the fall season, The Prestige at PGA West, the BYU men's golf team captured a third-place finish Tuesday.

The Prestige, hosted by UC Davis and Stanford, has quickly become one of the nation's top collegiate golf tournaments by bringing together 15 of the nation's top academic and golf-playing universities.

The No. 24 ranked Cougars (286-289-286--861) finished just two strokes behind first place UCLA (283-295-281--859), who is currently ranked No. 4 in the nation, and one stroke behind TCU (293-280-287--860) who is ranked No. 6 in the nation.

"We had our chances coming down the stretch, but fell a couple of strokes short," head coach Bruce Brockbank said.

Individually, freshman Jake Ellison led the Cougars at six-under-par (72-69-69--210) to tie for third place and record his top career finish. Junior Todd Miller and freshman Clay Ogden both tied for 16th place at two-over-par with scores of 70-71-77--218 and 71-74-73--218 respectively. Sophomore Clay Bingham (73-75-72--220) tied for 22nd place, just short of a top-20 finish, and Oscar Alvarez (73-76-72--221) tied for 28th place.

" I was pleased with the effort of these guys," Brockbank said. "We have great kids who work hard and continue to improve."

The Cougars played against TCU, Pepperdine, UCLA, Northwestern, Colorado, Stanford, Kansas, UC Davis, Washington, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pacific, UC Irvine and Yale, a field consisting of 78 players. BYU played on the par-72 LaQuinta Mountain Course, which measures 6,841.

The top individual finisher was TCU's Colby Beckstrom (71-68-67--206) who shot 10-under-par.

BYU has recorded five top-5 finishes in all of its five fall tournaments including four third-place finishes and one fourth-place finish.

"We had a good semester with great individual scores and performances," Brockbank said. "We came up a little short in some areas, but we've learned a lot this semester."

BYU won't compete again until Feb. 18-20, 2004 at the John H. Burns Invitational in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Final Team/Individual Standings
         1   UCLA                     283  295  281    859
         9    Chris Heintz             68   74   71    213
        10    Steve Conway             72   72   70    214
      T 11    Roy Moon                 68   75   72    215
      T 22    John Merrick             75   74   71    220
      T 28    John Poucher             76   76   69    221
         2   TCU                      293  280  287    860
         1    Colby Beckstrom          71   68   67    206
      T  6    Adam Meyer               70   74   68    212
      T 33    J.J. Killeen             78   69   75    222
      T 45    Drew Stoltz              76   72   77    225
      T 66    Jeff Marcinowski         76   71   87    234
         3   Brigham Young Univ.      286  289  286    861
      T  3    Jake Ellison             72   69   69    210
      T 16    Todd Miller              70   71   77    218
      T 16    Clay Ogden               71   74   73    218
      T 22    Clay Bingham             73   75   72    220
      T 28    Oscar Alvarez            73   76   72    221
         4   Pepperdine Univ.         284  294  285    863
         5    Michael Putnam           68   73   70    211
        13    Alex Coe                 72   75   69    216
      T 16    Brian O'Flaherty         71   74   73    218
      T 28    Chris Elliott            73   74   74    221
      T 33    Randy Creighton          76   73   73    222
      T  5   Colorado, U. of          286  293  289    868
      T  6    Kane Webber              73   71   68    212
      T 14    Jeff Hanson              70   74   73    217
      T 20    Kenny Coakley            70   74   75    219
      T 40    Derek O'Neill            76   74   73    223
      T 49    Edward McGlasson         73   76   78    227
      T  5   Northwestern             286  292  290    868
      T  3    Tom Johnson              67   75   68    210
      T 11    Dillon Dougherty         73   71   71    215
      T 40    Bryson Young             71   77   75    223
      T 42    Casey Strunk             76   72   76    224
      T 60    T.C. Ford                75   74   82    231
         7   Kansas, U. of            284  303  289    876
      T 14    Andrew Price             72   74   71    217
      T 22    Kevin Ward               70   75   75    220
      T 33    Gary Woodland            69   82   71    222
      T 47    Tyler Docking            77   77   72    226
      T 57    Ryan Rainer              73   77   80    230
         8   UC Davis                 290  300  287    877
      T  6    Eric Restrepo            71   74   67    212
      T 22    Scott Gordon             74   77   69    220
      T 28    Brett Borchers           69   76   76    221
      T 42    Louie Bishop             76   73   75    224
        77    Chris Kilkenny           78   84   82    244
         9   Washington, U. of        301  290  295    886
      T 20    Dan Potter               74   71   74    219
      T 22    Brock Mackenzie          75   74   71    220
      T 33    Alex Prugh               75   72   75    222
      T 45    Erik Olson               77   73   75    225
        76    Reid Rader               78   83   80    241
        10   Stanford University      283  302  303    888
         2    Zack Miller              67   67   74    208
      T 22    Kevin Blue               68   73   79    220
      T 60    Kyle Gentry              71   83   77    231
      T 66    Pat Phillips             79   79   76    234
      T 73    Brandon Lawson           77   85   76    238
        11   Oklahoma, U. of          301  295  300    896
      T 33    Anthony Kim              75   73   74    222
      T 33    Blake Martin             78   73   71    222
      T 49    Brodie Flanders          72   75   80    227
      T 55    Martin Flores            79   74   75    228
        78    Brad Purcell             76   85   91    252
        12   UC-Irvine                303  302  299    904
      T 16    Vinnie Poncino           71   70   77    218
      T 49    Neno Boonyaplanun        76   76   75    227
      T 66    Derek Uyesaka            82   79   73    234
        70    Ryne Rindfleisch         77   84   74    235
        71    Will Park                79   77   80    236
        13   Pacific, U. of the       301  301  304    906
      T 42    Matt Kern                73   74   77    224
      T 55    Andrew Bostrom           78   75   75    228
      T 57    Troy McKinley            77   74   79    230
      T 60    Miles Kirkpatrick        73   78   80    231
        72    Reid Scarff              86   78   73    237
        14   Oregon, U. of            297  302  309    908
      T 49    Mike Sica                74   75   78    227
      T 49    Gregg LaVoie             77   76   74    227
      T 49    Dustin Pewarchuk         72   76   79    227
      T 57    Matt Ma                  75   75   80    230
      T 64    Jimmy White              76   79   78    233
        15   Yale University          303  311  308    922
      T 47    Brian Kim                79   72   75    226
      T 60    Steve Gray               73   79   79    231
      T 64    Rick Reissman            75   82   76    233
      T 66    Dan Levy                 77   78   79    234
      T 73    Benjamin Levy            78   82   78    238