Ranking the top spring tournaments

Tick, tick, tick.

The second half of the 2010-11 season is slowly drawing near (too slowly for those in the snow-bound Northeast). As I anxiously await the end of the winter break, it got me thinking about what might be the top tournaments on the men's and women's spring schedules.

While subjectively there are certain events that come to mind quickly, I decided to use the Golf World college coaches' rankings to try and make things a bit more scientific. I looked at the scheduled for every men's team that received at least one vote in the final fall Golf World/Nike Golf poll and every women's team that received at least one vote in the final fall Golf World/NGCA poll.

Listed below are the top 15 men's and women's tournaments, ranked in order of which events have the most teams in their field that have received at least one vote in the coaches' poll. The chart also breaks down how many schools ranked in the top five, top 10 and top 25 are in the field if you prefer those as a barometer for how "strong" an event is.

So what is the toughest spring events? On the men's side, UNLV's Southern Highlands Collegiate Masters in Las Vegas, which will be held March 11-13, has 14 teams in the field that received votes in the Golf World/Nike Golf coaches' poll and 10 schools that are ranked in the top 25. As for the women, the Liz Murphey Collegiate Classic at the University of Georgia GC, set for April 1-3, has 18 teams in the field that also received votes for the Golf World/NGCA coaches' poll and 15 top-25 programs set to compete.

MEN

__WOMEN

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