It may be the middle of winter, but college golf’s spring season is upon us; here’s how things are shaping up for the Colorado-based DI teams, and the top local DII programs
By Gary Baines – 1/20/2026
There are very few college sports where the schedule is set up similarly to the way it’s done in men and women’s golf.
It essentially boils down to this: Roughly two months of official competition in what can loosely be termed the fall (September and October), then almost three months of off-season (November, December and January), followed by approximately fourth months of the official spring schedule (February, March, April and May), then another off-season (June, July and August).
Of the college sports common at the majority of schools that compete intercollegiately, about the only other one that operates similarly to golf is tennis, though combinations of cross country/track & field and volleyball/beach volleyball — which may draw from the same pool of athletes — schedule similarly.
In any case, it’s about time for college golfers to resume their season after the winter break. In fact, two Colorado-based NCAA Division I teams make their “spring” season debuts in January as the Colorado State University men are in Thousand Oaks, Calif. Jan. 26-28 and the University of Colorado women are in Guadalajara, Mexico Jan. 30-31. The remainder of the nine DI golf teams in the Centennial State will tee it up for real in the “spring” by Feb. 16.
Two Colorado DI teams will go into the spring schedule ranked in the top 50 in the nation, according to Scoreboard — the CU women (43rd) and the CU men (45th), while four local DII teams fall into that category — the men from CSU Pueblo (13th), Colorado Mesa (16th) and Colorado Christian (38th), and the women from CSU Pueblo (21st).
Of course, though both are important, the spring portion of the golf schedule is more so than the fall, as it wraps up with conference/league championship tournaments and, potentially, NCAA regional and national championship berths.
Here’s a brief rundown of the Colorado-based DI teams going into the spring:
CU MEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 16-18 — The Prestige at PGA West, La Quinta, Calif.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Second place (twice).
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 45th in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 160. Parker Paxton.
Conference Tournament: April 27-29 — Big 12, Hutchinson, Kan.
CU WOMEN
Spring Season Opener: Jan. 30-31 — Collegiate Invitational at Guadalajara (Mexico).
Top Team Finish in Fall: One win (Ptarmigan Ram Classic).
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 43rd in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 127. Carolyn Fuller.
Conference Tournament: April 23-25 — Big 12, Dallas.
CSU MEN
Spring Season Opener: Jan. 26-28 — Southwestern Intercollegiate, Thousand Oaks, Calif.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Second place.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 100th in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 248. Jake Rodgers.
Conference Tournament: April 24-26 — Mountain West, Tucson, Ariz.
CSU WOMEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 2-4 — Paradise Invitational, Boca Raton, Fla.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Eighth place.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 132nd in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 361. Kara Kaneshiro.
Conference Tournament: April 21-23 —Mountain West, Palm Springs, Calif.
DU MEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 15-17 — Loyola Intercollegiate, Goodyear, Ariz.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Seventh place.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 180th in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 830. Jet Hernandez.
Conference Tournament: May 3-5 — Summit League, Phoenix.
DU WOMEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 2-4 — FAU Paradise Invitational, Boca Raton, Fla.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Fourth place.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 93rd in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 179. Logan Hale.
Conference Tournament: April 26-28 — Summit League, Phoenix.
UNC MEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 1-3 — Compadres Collegiate, Playa del Carmen, Mexico.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Eighth place.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 215th in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 302. Kaelen Dulany.
Conference Tournament: April 27-29 — Big Sky, Litchfield, Ariz.
UNC WOMEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 9-10 — San Diego State Classic Invitational, San Diego.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Third place.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 140th in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 252. Timbre Shehee.
Conference Tournament: April 20-22 — Big Sky, Goodyear, Ariz.
AIR FORCE MEN
Spring Season Opener: Feb. 15-17 — Loyola Intercollegiate, Goodyear, Ariz.
Top Team Finish in Fall: Third place (3-team field); ninth place in large-field event.
Scoreboard National Team Ranking: 250th in NCAA Division I.
Scoreboard Top Individual Player Ranking Nationally: 1,103. Carson Baker.
Conference Tournament: May 3-5 — Mountain West, Tucson, Ariz.
Five players at Colorado schools claimed individual tournament titles in the fall — Colorado Christian’s Peyton Jones (2), UNC’s Kaelen Dulany (1), CSU Pueblo’s Marius Dosiere (1) and Thale Victoria Estensen (1), and Colorado Mesa’s Dylan Everett (1).
Three Colorado programs landed a total of six team titles in the fall — the CU women (1), the CSU Pueblo women (3) and the Colorado Mesa men (2).
About the Writer: Gary Baines has covered golf in Colorado continuously since 1983. He was a sports writer at the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, then the sports editor there, and has written regularly for ColoradoGolf.org since 2009. The University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2022. He owns and operates ColoradoGolfJournal.com