Kuest shoots 10 under at St. Mary's to take day one lead

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – Peter Kuest continued his hot streak with his best round as a Cougar, firing a 61 (-10) to put himself and the Cougars in first place after one day at the Saint Mary’s Invitational.

"What an unbelievable round from Peter," BYU head coach Bruce Brockbank said. "It's so fun to watch a guy shoot a score like that, one of the best I've seen in my time as a coach."

Kuest sits seven strokes ahead of San Francisco's Soren Lind and Pepperdine's Joshua McCarthy, who are tied for second.

Kuest's BYU career-best 61 came just nine days after he fired a 64 (-7) in the Pacific Invitational, his lowest 18-hole score to that point as a Cougar. The impressive round puts him in second place on BYU’s all-time lowest scores list, behind Daniel Summerhays’ 60 in the PING Preview in 2006.

He wasn’t the only Cougar to have a nice first day, however. Austin Banz shot a 69 (-2) to put himself in fourth, and Rhett Rasmussen was one-under at 70 for an eighth-place tie. Chad Hardy shot an even 71 to tie for 13th and Carson Lundell came in 69th with a 76. Individual competitor Kelton Hirsch finished with a 73 (+2) to tie for 38th after the first day.

"The other guys on the team were really solid as well, it was a very good day for the Cougars," Brockbank added. "There is plenty of golf left but what a great start."

BYU shot 271 as a team to put them 10 strokes ahead of second place Pepperdine, and tie the fifth-best score through 18 holes for a BYU team. Fellow West Coast Conference opponents San Francisco, Saint Mary's and Santa Clara finished in fifth, sixth and 17th place, respectively. University of Utah is also competing at the tournament, finishing in 10th after the first round. 

The second of three rounds will be played tomorrow, with live stats and the leaderboard found at Golfstat.