Will Gordon, a high school junior from Hot Springs, played in both the U.S. Junior Am and the Junior PGA Championship, and Connor Gaunt, a grad student at LSU from Cabot, made it to the round of 16 at the U.S. Am.
By: Chris Werner
USGA P.J. Boatwright Jr. Intern
September 20, 2023
Two current ASGA players competed and made headlines in some of golf’s biggest events this summer. Will Gordon, a high school junior from Hot Springs, played in both the U.S. Junior Am and the Junior PGA Championship, and Connor Gaunt, a grad student at LSU from Cabot, made it to the round of 16 at the U.S. Am.
The ASGA asked each of them about their experiences at the tournaments mentioned. Below are the Q&A sessions.
Will Gordon
Gordon played in the U.S. Junior Am at the Daniel Island Club in Charleston, South Carolina, in late July, and came up two shots short of qualifying for a playoff to potentially advance to the match play portion of the event.
The Hot Springs native then traveled home where Hot Springs Country Club was preparing to host the 2023 Junior PGA Championship.
Gordon made both the second and third-round cuts at the Junior PGA, firing a 6-under 65 in Round 2 — tied for the lowest round by any male player that week — and finishing in a tie for 24th.
Arkansas State Golf Association: Tell me about your experience playing in big events this summer, first the U.S. Junior Am then the Junior PGA Championship at one of your home courses in Hot Springs.
Will Gordon: I had an amazing experience playing in big tournaments this summer! Playing in the U.S. Junior was one of the coolest experiences I have ever had. The USGA treated their players like tour pros. They set up the course hard and challenging, and I enjoyed the mental test that came with it. Unfortunately, I didn't play the way I wanted to, but it was definitely an amazing experience. The week after the U.S. Junior I came back home to Hot Springs and played in the Junior PGA Championship. Playing in the Junior PGA Championship was nothing short of amazing. Playing in front of my home crowd was surreal. I wish I would've finished better that week but making both cuts and being able to play all four days was pretty special.
ASGA: Take me through the week at Hot Springs, how did it feel to play in such a prestigious tournament so close to home?
WG: The Junior PGA week was one of the most memorable events that I have ever been a part of. Playing in front of the members at Hot Springs Country Club, the people who have watched me play ever since I was little, and my biggest supporters was very special. Yeah, I could've and should've played better, but it was still an amazing experience, and I'm so thankful I got the opportunity to be a part of that. Whenever you get to play a big tournament on your home golf course, the feeling you get on that first tee is very cool.
ASGA: Did you feel any extra pressure to perform since you knew the courses so well?
WG:I felt like there was some added pressure for sure. I knew that the members and people who were supporting me wanted and expected me to play well out there. Knowing that I know those golf courses better than anyone in the field gave me a little bit of pressure because there is no excuse for playing poorly.
ASGA: Did you have a "Welcome to the Junior PGA" moment? I know the PGA featured you on social media a little bit.
WG: My "Welcome to the PGA" moment was the environment of the tournament. The participants got nice tee gifts and had to wear a pass in the clubhouse. With the golf course being in great shape, it made it feel like a professional tournament. The video the PGA did about me was also really cool!
ASGA: Talk about that second-round 65 — tied for the lowest round of any male player that week — what was working so well for you that day and how were you able to card such a low number?
WG: The second round was one of the more stress-free rounds of golf I have ever played. I wasn't hitting it all that good until the back nine, but I was making every putt. On the back nine, once I started to hit it better, putts stopped falling. It was just one of those days where I shot 65 but it could've been a lot lower. It was exactly what I planned to do, After I shot even the first day, I wanted to shoot a score that was going to get me back into contention, and fortunately, I did just that.
ASGA: How’s the college recruiting trail treating you thus far? I know you’ve got some Big XII and SEC schools looking your way. What’s your attitude towards college recruiting at this point in your career?
WG: College recruiting has been a fun process. I have talked to numerous big D1 schools and have gotten to learn more about each college's great programs. As of now, I have narrowed down my options to two. I'm confident I will make the right decision and I'm thankful for the opportunities that I have gotten this summer! Gordon committed to the Arkansas Razorbacks on Sept. 5.
ASGA: What do you feel has improved in your game recently and what do you want to improve on as you head into your junior year?
WG: This summer the major thing that has improved is my putting. I've always been a good ball striker but I've struggled making putts. I worked really hard last season on the putting green and it paid off this summer. Looking into the future I need to improve my mental game and work more on chipping. Both have definitely improved this year, but there is always room for improvement.
ASGA: Tell me about your golf journey, how you got started, and what it has been like to get to where you are now.
WG: My golf journey started when I was a little kid. I’d go to the country club when I was about 6 and hit golf balls with my dad. I started to play tournaments around 11 years old, and that's where my love for the game sparked. I fell in love with tournament golf, and I wanted to keep playing in bigger and bigger tournaments. I was a multi-sport athlete until 7th grade. That's when I decided to take the next step and solely focus on golf. From 7th grade until now it has been a long, fun, and tough process. I have spent countless hours at the golf course trying to improve in every aspect of my game, and I am starting to see results because of that!
ASGA: What are your goals for the rest of the calendar year, I know we've got to finish up Junior Match Play and your season at Lakeside has started. You got second in last year’s 5A team tournament and won it as a team during your freshman year.
WG: My goals coming up are for me and my high school team to win state and I would love to go back to high school state overalls. I personally want to take my game to an even bigger level — I want my scoring average to be lower, and I want to play better in bigger tournaments. Hopefully, I can come out with a victory at the resumption of the ASGA Junior Match Play. Gordon won the ASGA Boy's Junior Match Play Championship on Sept. 10.
Connor Gaunt
Gaunt defended his Arkansas Amateur Championship title in June at Chenal Country Club, finishing at 12-under for 54 holes, three shots ahead of Mitchell Ford. Then he qualified for his second straight U.S. Amateur Championship, collecting medalist honors at DeSoto Golf Club in Hot Springs Village on July 17 with a 9-under 64.
After failing to qualify for match play at the 2022 U.S. Am, Gaunt did that and then some this year at Cherry Hills Country Club.
With childhood friend and Southern Arkansas senior Caleb Miller on the bag, Gaunt finished the stroke play portion at even par to claim the 42nd seed in the 64-man stroke play bracket.
He then beat No. 23 seed Ethan Paschal 6&4 in the round of 64, to set up a match against North Carolina’s Austin Greaser.
In the round of 32, Gaunt defeated Greaser — the then-8th-ranked amateur in the world — 3&2.
Although Gaunt would be ousted in the round of 16, he said the high finish on amateur golf’s biggest stage gives him a lot of confidence heading back for his final year of college eligibility.
In this season’s first college two college events, Gaunt’s LSU Tigers won the Golfweek Collegiate Kickoff on Sept. 6 — their first team win since March of 2022 — and finished sixth at the Valero Texas Collegiate.
Gaunt finished the Golfweek Collegiate in a tie for fifth place individually and the Valero Collegiate in a tie for 4th, one shot behind a group of medalists.
Arkansas State Golf Association: What did you kind of learn about yourself and your own game in Colorado this year, I know it was a much better showing than you had last year.
Connor Gaunt: The difference between this year and last year was when I got there I felt like really belonged. This year I just said, ‘Let’s go win this thing.’ Playing well the whole summer led up to me believing that my game was as good as anybody's and it was going to be hard to beat me. That was kind of a mindset going into the whole thing.
ASGA: What sort of adjustments did you make mentally or with your physical game leading up to it to kind of back up that belief and how did that mindset change?
CG: I guess, being one of the better golfers around in the ASGA stuff and playing not to lose instead of playing to win. It's kind of been something I've struggled with. But this year, I just kind of had the mindset of, ‘Let's just go see how bad we can beat people.’ Like, just see how many strokes I can win by. Really just kind of putting the pedal down and not really letting up. And then when things didn't go my way which, in golf, is a lot of the time, just being able to handle your stuff and not make any big numbers and just keep plugging away and keep doing what you know you can do.
ASGA: Mentally or technically, what were the keys to your success that week, making it to the Round of 16? I only saw the tail end of that last match but what was kind of working well for you the whole week to make it that far?
CG: This summer I played a lot of golf with my buddies back home. I mean, we played 36 holes every day, so golf swing was feeling good, definitely got plenty of reps in there, and mentally, it was just I played back home, played at Rolling Hills Country Club and I can attribute a lot of my success to that. Just because that place, it's really good to go and make a bunch of birdies. I used to get like 5-under in a tournament and be like ‘Oh my gosh, let's not screw this up.’ And now, playing at Rolling Hills, I can go out there and make 10 birdies in a round or 12 birdies in a round, try and shoot 59.
It's kind of like what Bryson [DeChambeau] said, ‘Go play from the ladies tees.’ Like, ‘Be comfortable going low like that.’ And so I just think it all comes down to just keeping the pedal down mentally and not really letting up, being comfortable with being uncomfortable for sure.
ASGA: Have you ever played from the front tees at Rolling Hills, and, if so, what's the lowest score you’ve ever shot?
CG: I haven't played the front tees at Rolling Hills, but I’ve shot 59 Probably four times from the backs there. It's definitely a fun place and I attribute a lot of my success to Rolling Hills and the guys who Keep it manicured.
ASGA: I know you talked about playing with your friends this summer and one of them was on the bag for you in Colorado, Caleb Miller. What kind of an asset was he on the bag for you and how did it kind of feel to have him there with you on the biggest stage in amateur golf,f some might say?
CG: It was awesome. We'll never forget that week, me or him. I mean, Caleb’s been my friend since we were nine years old playing golf every day. If you spend a lot of time around Caleb, he's just a calming calming guy to be around. He just makes you laugh. He's a super goofy dude. And just really, that's what I told him, I mean, we had some big galleries that were watching our group, and I looked at Caleb and I was like, ‘Man, I'm enjoying the hell out of this right now,’ and Caleb's like, ‘You think you are?’ He enjoyed it just as much as I did.
Definitely him being a calming presence and being a dang good golfer himself, he knows how to manage his way around a golf course. And he’s probably one of the best green readers I've ever been around. So he definitely gave me some money reads out there that week and I attribute a lot of my success to having C-Mill on the bag.
ASGA: You just talked about the big galleries, did you have sort of a welcome to the U.S. Am moment? I know you were there last year but did it ever really get old and did you have a moment that week, either when you got there or maybe when you started advancing through the bracket where you thought, ‘This is this is a pretty pretty big opportunity?’
CG: I think just showing up, I guess in the practice round when you get there and you're like ‘the rough is eight inches tall and if you hit in the rough, you're basically chipping out and trying to make par from 180 yards away.
Also, I think the round of 32 when I played [then No. 8 amateur in the world an 2022 U.S. Am runner-up] Austin Greaser. We had a big gallery following and it’s just something you always dream of. I mean, we had probably 500 people following us on every hole. Usually, in the past, you have a big gallery and get kind of nervous, but I just told Caleb, I said, ‘Let's enjoy the walk, and let's enjoy this moment we got right here, and let's see if we can't go beat this guy.’ And we did.
Being there on the 16th pole when I made that six-footer to win the hole and win the match, having little kids there as I’m walking off the green, they're asking for my autograph. That’s just hard work paying off and just something you always dream of.
ASGA: I remember seeing the little edit that the USGA put out on Instagram about that match, and you talked kind of about your mindset of, ‘Let's see how much we can beat these people by.’ Did it help you in match play that you were the underdog in every match because you weren't seeded great, but, it doesn't really matter your seed as long as you get through the stroke play part.
CG: That's what I told my dad and Caleb and all my family. I was like, ‘Look, I just need to get to match play and I can go put in work there.’ But yeah, I guess just leading up to the Austin Greaser match I mean, I had to sleep on it knowing that I was playing him. I knew he was a good player, played in the Masters, played on the Walker Cup team and I just told Caleb, I was like, look, ‘Nobody here knows Connor Gaunt from Cabot, Arkansas, but everybody knows. Austin Greaser, let's go make a name for ourselves today.’ I was like, ‘I just kind of want to beat the brakes off this guy.’
I won the first hole and never trailed in the match from the first hole. So, I was just super, super blessed to be able to play that well. And Austin Greaser’s an unbelievable golfer, one of the best players I've ever played with. But I guess the golf gods just went in my favor that day.
ASGA: I guess maybe off the golf course, and maybe it's the same Austin Greaser moment, but when people ask you ‘Oh, what do you remember about the U.S. Am in 2023?,’ Do you have any stories that stick out that you think you might tell when the time comes to kind of reminisce about your experience?
CG: Yeah, for sure. A lot of the Austin Greaser stuff and having C-Mill on the bag, but one I’ll always remember is I was standing on the 10th Tee is Austin Greaser and there's probably 500 people around the tee box and I just rip driver down the middle of this fairway that's super tight. And everybody was like, you heard all the hoots and hollers and it was just something that something that just will stick with you because I remember when I was nine years old watching at the St. Jude Classic in Memphis, those guys like that. Just to be the guy hitting the actual golf shot was a big deal.
ASGA: One more question, this goes hand-in-hand now that you've played one college tournament this year and competed so well, how much confidence did it give you coming right into the college season less than a month removed from that performance?
GC: It makes these golf courses of playing now seem a little bit easier because a U.S. Am is kind of like a U.S. Open where it’s kind of the toughest. conditions you can play. Pins are tucked, and greens are fast, fairways are firm, greens are firm. It just puts everything into perspective, like ‘Man, I've hit a shot that's harder than this before, I can pull off pretty much anything I need to. Being able to be mentally tough is the biggest thing. Golf can humble you real quick and just being able to take the punches in the face and be able to keep going is something that the U.S. Am will teach you and it's really beneficial to carry that over to a college season.
