Nor’easter? Nor’Problem. Alex Zhang Leads Men’s Golf to Victory at Macdonald Cup

On Friday Nights across America, the stadium lights shine bright. From Pawtucket to Cary, Bloomington to Allen, and all across the 50 states, a chant is so often heard: “HE’S A FRESHMAN.”

Repeated in disjointed synchrony between the confused superfans and football fanatics, one other city heard the arrival of a freshman phenom the world of Ivy golf had yet to glean.

In New Haven, Conn., at the redesigned Yale University Golf Course, freshman Alex Zhang (-2, 1st) of the reigning Ivy League Champion, Harvard Crimson (+9, 1st), certainly didn’t make age an issue of his campaign to win the Macdonald Cup.

Despite a historic fall Nor’easter shortening the tournament to one round, a win is still a win for the rookie.

Along with A. Zhang’s individual victory, the Crimson also stood victorious as a team, spurred by strong performances from junior captain William Ma (+2, T6), sophomore Morgan Riley (+4, T12), and sophomore Reese Jensen (+5, T21).

Senior Jonathan Hartono (+4, IND T12) and junior Barry Zhang (+6, T28) rounded out the six-man Harvard roster.

The Macdonald Cup wasn’t just significant because of the Crimson’s freshman phenom, but also because Brown (+33, T11) competed in its first Division I tournament against its conference rivals since its varsity team was cut in 2020. The Bears have not fielded a varsity squad since the COVID-19 pandemic, so the Ancient Eight is once again whole, with all its members facing off on the courses.

Within the conference, Harvard was trailed by its rival Princeton (+16, 3rd), which the Crimson bested by just one stroke in the 2026 Ivy Tournament.

Non-Ivy teams also put on a strong showing, with Seton Hall (+15, 2nd) and Loyola Maryland (+17, T4) joining Dartmouth (+17, T4) to close out the top five.

Two other notable individual performances across the Ivy League came from two freshman golfers, including Yale’s Theo Snyder (+1, T4) and Princeton’s William Chang (+1, T4), two names to watch following the winter golf recess.

Yet Snyder had an advantage that, according to Ma, Harvard didn’t have.

“The news came in Thursday night that because of the Nor’easter they had shifted the tournament up the whole day, which meant that the tournament would start on Friday,” Ma explained. “And for us, that meant we would see Yale, and we would play in the tournament without ever having done a practice round, so we just decided to roll with it.”

And roll with it the Crimson did. Despite lacking familiarity with the refreshed Yale course, A. Zhang kept his composure to bring home the round with a score of two under, the only golfer in the tournament to hit under par.

“I think the thing that sticks out to me about Alex as well is that he has a really good demeanor on the golf course. He’s super locked in, but he also doesn’t take himself too seriously,” Ma said, talking about A. Zhang. “He’s a pretty chill, relaxed guy, and I think that helps him compete really well and at a really high level.”

Harvard and Princeton both competed in the Rod Myers Invitational earlier this week, where the Ivy foes had to contend with rainy conditions that canceled the third round.

“Fairways and greens were super firm on Friday, which always makes for more interesting tests just because you have to get a little more crafty with your shots and think about your landing areas a bit more,” Ma said.

“It was cold and really, really windy. And so that usually means you need to flight more shots down to take out the wind and also just be more precise on your puts and chips as well,” he added.

Tricky weather has basically become the norm for Harvard, but the repeated exposure to harsh conditions is clearly supporting a trend in the right direction for Riley and the squad as a whole.

Riley, in particular, having played in North Carolina in high school, had much more of an adjustment than, for example, Harvard’s resident Canadian, A. Zhang.

Coming into college, maybe they hadn’t worked on their flighted down shots as much or their off-speed shots, which are all things that you need in the wind, but after those first couple of difficult events, they just put the work in, started working on more of those specialty shots, and they definitely showed a lot of growth in that,” Ma said, describing the younger players’ efforts to adapt to the New England weather.

“I think it’s mostly attributed to their work ethic and their desire to improve in those conditions,” he summarized.

Despite shooting a triple bogey on the sixth hole, Riley tallied two birdies on the front nine, bringing his round score to 74, which at Yale’s par-70 course was enough to secure a tie for 12th place.

A. Zhang, in line with his consistent demeanor, stayed even with par throughout the first 13 holes, hitting just one bogey on 15 and three birdies on 14, 16, and 18 to finish two under. Holes 16 and 18 were the only par fives on the course.

The longest holes were some of the most polarizing for Harvard, as although 16 was Ma’s most troubling with a double bogey, B. Zhang hit the team’s only eagle of the tournament.

Hartono also excelled on the last three holes, hitting two birdies on holes 16 and 17 to keep his score at four over par and to tie for 12th place.

The fifth hole was the best for the Crimson, as all but Jensen, who made a birdie, hit even par on the course’s shortest hole, a 146-yard par three.

Despite two shortened tournaments, Harvard has performed incredibly well in its early fall campaign. The team won the Red Bandanna Invitational, took third at Duke’s Rod Myers, and claimed first at the Macdonald Cup.

However, as Ma emphasized, the Crimson’s upcoming tournament on Oct. 5-6, the Maidstone Invitational, in East Hampton, N.Y., hosted by Loyola Maryland, will pose a challenge for Harvard.

“It’s probably the best event that we play in the fall in terms of the place that we’re at, the field that we’re competing against, and the overall player experience,” the captain said.

“We’ve been there the last three years, and so we have a lot of knowledge to build on from previous years for how to play that course,” he added. “Hopefully we’ll be able to put our best foot forward and have a good showing there.”

—Staff writer Leo P. Petropoulos can be reached at [email protected].