Led by junior Nick Taylor, who won his second career collegiate tournament, the UW men’s golf team fought hard against a strong field early this week, finishing fourth at the CordeValle Collegiate.

Despite losing out to the three teams who finished first, second and third in the country last year — USC, Stanford and UCLA — the team finished a mere four strokes out of second place, leaving them with a feeling that they could have done more.

“We’re disappointed because we feel like we should’ve beat Stanford and UCLA,” coach Matt Thurmond said. “But still, we beat a lot of really good teams.”

Taylor’s impressive 4-under par and individual first place finish kept the Huskies near the top of the standings all week, as did Richard Lee’s 2-over par, which tied him for tenth in the individual standings.

“Nick played tremendously this week, despite conditions that were very tough,” Thurmond said. “As did Richard, who finished in the top 10 for the fourth time in a row.”

Huskies Chris Killmer and John Wise both finished in the top 40 individual standings.

This tournament marks the end of the fall season for the team, but Thurmond is confident about going into the break.

“All in all it was a great fall for the guys, but we’ll improve on it and do even better in the spring.”

The team’s next event is the Waikoloa Intercollegiate in Kamuela, Hawaii Feb. 4.

Reach reporter Scott Eisen at sports@dailyuw.com.