Christmas 5—CHAMPAIGN — The smile starts to show on Luke Guthrie’s face when he starts telling the story last week.
Same for Mike Small, even though they’re not in the same place and the successful Illinois men’s golf coach is watching a video on his cell phone of what one of his former star players is saying about him.
The year is 2007, although Guthrie can’t recall the exact year off the top of his head. But what the Quincy native, who became a Big Ten champion in 2011 and Big Ten Player of the Year in 2012 with the Illini, remembers is what makes this connection worthwhile all these years later.
Guthrie was on a recruiting trip at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Okla. Small was playing in the PGA Championship at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Okla., a little more than an hour away. Tiger Woods ended up winning the PGA Championship that August for his 13th major, with Small generating headlines of his own by earning low club pro honors and sharing the stage with Woods after the final round ended on that particular Sunday almost 16 years ago.
“I’m watching maybe my college coach compete in the PGA,” Guthrie recalled in a video shared by the Korn Ferry Tour on its Twitter account last Thursday, “and I was like, ‘I need to go learn from this guy.’ “
Plenty of other talented golfers have followed suit in the ensuing years. Making this particular thought ring true the day after the US celebrated its 247th birthday: The Illinois men’s golf program is the current benchmark when it comes to professional success of its former players among all the Illini sports on campus.
Campus tour
Sure, Illinois football will have 29 alums of the program on NFL rosters when training camps open across the country later this month. But those numbers will dwindle some when 53-man rosters emerge, and experienced, skill-position players who have made a difference in the NFL are lacking. Illinois has the same number of kickers (Chase McLaughlin with the Buccaneers and James McCourt with the Jaguars) in the league as quarterbacks and running backs at the moment (rookie quarterback Tommy DeVito is a longshot to make the Giants roster and rookie running back Chase Brown has yet to have a carry with the Bengals).
Illinois men’s basketball does not have enough former players in the NBA to constitute a starting lineup. Ayo Dosunmu could re-sign with the Bulls after spending his first two seasons in the NBA averaging 8.7 points, 2.9 assists and 2.8 rebounds with his hometown team after the Bulls drafted him in 2021. But the 23-year-old guard hasn’t come close to the production he had in his All-American campaign during the 2020-21 season with the Illini and isn’t a lock to stay with the Bulls next season. Meyers Leonard played sparingly with the Bucks towards the end of last season, and it’s unclear if the 31-year-old center will find a roster spot next season.
Illinois baseball won’t have a representative in the MLB All-Star Game next week in Seattle, continuing a trend of almost three decades since Oakwood native and former Illini catcher Darrin Fletcher made his lone All-Star Game playing for the Montreal Expos in 1994 .
So the point is this. Given the small roster size of college golf programs — Illinois had nine players this past season — it’s rather remarkable how many players Illinois had competing this past weekend on four different pro tours.
Hitting the links
Of course, golf is a sport you can play well past middle age and still thrive in it.
Just look at Steve Stricker.
The 56-year-old, who will forever have his place in golf immortality after serving as the US team captain during its dominating 2021 Ryder Cup win, placed second on Sunday at the US Senior Open. He finished two strokes behind champion Bernhard Langer and surpassed $3 million in winnings already this season.
Now, consider this other jaw-dropping stat. It was the ninth time in 12 events Stricker has played this year on the PGA Champions Tour where he either finished first or second. That means 75 percent of the tournaments Stricker has entered, he’s found his name either at the top of the leaderboard or within striking distance. Unreal.
Also unreal? Small staying in contention after the first round of the US Senior Open last Thursday. He ultimately couldn’t maintain the pace that had him tied for second after the first round, finishing in a tie for 47th at 13-over par. But the 57-year-old made the cut in Stevens Point, Wis., in only his second pro tournament this year since the day job he does so well takes up most of his time.
In-state pride
Nick Hardy and Thomas Detry didn’t have the best weekend in Detroit, with both former Illini missing the cut at the Rocket Mortgage Classic in the PGA Tour’s latest event. Hardy is expected back in his home state later this week, though, one of three former Illini in the field at the John Deere Classic in Silvis.
The PGA Tour event Stricker won three straight times from 2009 to 2011 to resurrect his own pro career will also have recent graduate Tommy Kuhl in the field — making his PGA Tour debut — and veteran pro DA Points. Both Kuhl and Points received sponsor’s exemptions into the first PGA Tour event in Illinois this year before the BMW Championship tees off at Olympia Fields from Aug. 17-20.
The 23-year-old Kuhl is a Morton product embarking upon his pro career on the PGA Tour Canada after building himself into one of the best in college golf during his five seasons at Illinois. The 46-year-old Points, who has won three times on the PGA Tour, is playing in only his seventh tournament this year and first in almost two months for the Pekin native.
Living it up
Only one former Illini, Thomas Pieters, is on the LIV Tour that features no cuts in its three-round tournaments.
We’ll have to wait and see what the future of that renegade tour is after last month’s shocking revelations the PGA Tour and LIV would join forces to create a unified pro tour moving forward, with scant details on how that will look right now. Pieters is 38th in the 52-player points standings that LIV uses, and he wound up 18th at LIV’s recent stop this past weekend in Andalucía, Spain.
They’re thriving, too
Three other former Illini had respectable showings in the state this past weekend at the Memorial Health Championship, the Korn Ferry Tour event that stopped at Panther Creek Country Club in Springfield.
Adrien Dumont de Chassart continued his superb play in his first month as a pro, with the reigning Big Ten Player of the Year tying for eighth at 21-under par. He’s placed inside the Top 10 in all three of his Korn Ferry Tour starts, memorably winning his pro debut a month ago in South Carolina, and finds himself sixth on the Korn Ferry Tour money list and the tour’s points list. If he finishes in the Top 30 on the points list, Dumont de Chassart will earn a PGA Tour card for the 2024 season.
Michael Feagles and Brian Campbell also represented the Illini brand well in the state’s capital, too. The 25-year-old Feagles tied for 17th at 19-under in his best showing this year amid a burgeoning pro career, and the 30-year-old Campbell tied for 32nd at 16-under. Guthrie, playing in his first pro event since last June after stepping away from the game only to qualify for the Memorial Health Championship three days before the first round started, didn’t end up making the weekend cut. But he still shot a respectable 4-under.
Bringing us back to the video exchange between Guthrie and Small. Even though he doesn’t have a direct, daily influence on these players anymore, the lasting effects of lessons they learned during their time as Illini is evident.
Along with the admiration between player and coach.
“The respect is mutual,” Small said. “That guy right there is salt of the Earth. Couldn’t be a better man in the world right there.”
Couldn’t be a better Illinois program right now than what Small and his men’s golf team is up to, not only in Champaign, but throughout the world.
Matt Daniels is the sports editor at The News-Gazette. He can be reached at 217-373-7422 or at [email protected].