Pepperdine beats Oklahoma 3-2 for second national golf title

Oklahoma edged Illinois, then closed out Arizona State 3-2 in the semifinals

Pepperdine jumped out to a quick early lead in the title match, leading in three matches.

The Sooners earned the first point in a back-and-forth match.

Brightwell rallied from an early deficit to tie with consecutive birdies and went 1-up with a kick-in birdie on the 390-yard par-4 10th. Menante tied it with consecutive holes, Brightwell answered with two straight birdies on Nos. 15 and 16 to go back 1 up, then closed it out by getting up and down short of No. 18.

One match for the Sooners, but the Waves were leading the other four.

Joe Highsmith started strong and never stopped rolling against Garett Reband.

The Pepperdine junior won three straight holes, the first two on bogeys by Reband — he hit near the 12th fairway on No. 11 — then a 10-foot birdie on the 12th to go 5-up.

Highsmith closed it out with a par on the par-4 15th.

Pepperdine’s William Mouw wanted to face Quade Cummins, a member of OU’s 2017 national championship team, in the anchor match and made the most of it.

Mouw made 15-foot birdie on No. 9 to go 1-up and dropped a 4-foot birdie putt to make it 2-up up on the par-5 11th. He won consecutive holes starting at No. 13 and clinched Pepperdine’s second point when Brightwell just missed a birdie putt on No. 15.