GREENSBORO, N.C. -- After the first day of play at the O'Briant Jensen Memorial, the Christopher Newport men's golf team is in 18th place out of 21 teams. Senior Michael Thomas (+4) led the way and is sitting in the top 25 heading into the second round on Tuesday. 

 Playing at The Cardinal by Pete Dye, the Captains recorded 10 birdies and 41 pars between the five players on Monday. Thomas and Owen Cook (+6) each finished with sub-80 scores while Jacob Foti (+11) and Nick Alexander (+11) rounded out the team scoring. J.P. Carr (+12) was just one stroke behind his teammates after day one. 

Thomas and Cook each poured in a team-high three birdies on the Par 71 track and recorded matching scores on the front nine. It was the back where Thomas edged out his teammate for the round one lead, notching back-to-back birdies on the 435-yard par four 14th and 575-yard par five 15th holes. Thomas added nine pars to finish out his day with a 75. 

Cook had an impressive stretch with three birdies in five holes between 6-10 and added three straight pars from there. A stumble on the final two holes of the course was the only difference between him and his CNU teammate as Cook finished with a 77. Both players had nine pars in the round. 

Foti had four pars on the front and five more on the back while adding a birdie four on the 15th hole as well. He wrapped up the first round with an 82. Alexander matched his score with an up-and-down day that included back-to-back birdies on the 302-yard par four 3rd and 542-yard par five 4th holes. 

Finally, Carr strung together five pars on the front but encountered some difficulty on the back nine. He birdied the 435-yard par four 13th and added a par on 18 to wrap up the day with an 83. 

As a team, CNU closed out the first round at 32-over with a 316. They and the rest of the 21-team field will return to the course on Tuesday morning to finish the 36-hole tournament.