The Illinois men’s golf team has become a regular at the NCAA Championships. The Illini are one of six programs to finish among the nation’s top 30 in each of the past six seasons. Two of the past three individual national champions, including junior Thomas Pieters, have been Illini.

But that doesn’t mean this year’s Illinois squad is experienced.

Five Illini — one junior, two sophomores and two freshmen — will head to Tuesday’s NCAA Championships in Atlanta, with four NCAA Championships appearances between the players.

The lack of experience hasn’t limited No. 15-seed Illinois to this point. The Illini won their fifth straight Big Ten title late April and the program’s first NCAA regional title on May 12.

The underclassmen have been crucial to Illinois’ success. Sophomore Brian Campbell finished second at both Big Tens and regionals, while Big Ten Freshman of the Year Thomas Detry tied Campbell at regionals and finished in a tie for eighth in the conference. Freshman Charlie Danielson tied for fifth at regionals and led Illinois with a regional-low 65 in the first round.

Thirty teams will compete in a 54-hole stroke-play tournament for the first three days of the tournament, and the top eight teams in stroke-play will advance to face off in match-play to decide the team national champion. The individual national champion is decided by the low golfer in the stroke-play portion of the championship.

Illinois has only advanced out of stroke-play one time. Head coach Mike Small said the team will have to “not make stupid unforced errors that young teams do” if it wishes to make the match-play portion of the tournament.

“On tournaments that we play, we don’t make mistakes. We don’t do things we shouldn’t do,” he said. “If we do that well, we can be competitive and try to make match-play. But if we putt for double bogeys or short side ourselves on some holes and have bogeys in those situations, or have situations where we give shots away, we’re not strong enough to do that.”

Defending national champion Pieters said his game is in good shape to repeat as the nation’s best, despite finishing 10th at regionals.

“I played pretty well; I just didn’t score well,” Pieters said. “I didn’t make a lot of putts, but still it’s not bad.”

As one of just two northern teams in the championships, Pieters and the Illini will be at a disadvantage, Small said. The Capital City Club has Bermuda grass, a type of grass native to the south, which Illinois has limited experience playing on. Atlanta has more consistent weather than Illinois, where players have dealt with temperatures that have ranged 45 degrees in the last week.

Despite the different grass and weather, Illinois had success playing on a southern course in its regional, winning the Fayetteville, Ark., regional by three strokes over many southern teams.

“It shows that we can compete for a national championship,” Pieters said.

Johnathan can be reached at [email protected] and @jhett93.