The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jackets see their golf title hopes dashed
Coach was very confident team would win crown.
On Tuesday, Georgia Tech golf coach Bruce Heppler found himself typing out a text message to his team that he could have never before imagined sharing in the middle of March. The gist of the communication, Heppler said, was “I’ll always hold this group in very high esteem for what they accomplished and the way they went about stuff.”
In any other spring but this one, it would be an odd time to speak of the team in the past tense. But there, it was, the coach turning the page on his team two months before he would have hoped to do so. Heppler’s text followed the ACC’s announcement it had done the inevitable and canceled all athletics activities through the end of the academic year to help curtail the spread of the coronavirus.
“I think it’s set in a little bit more now,” Heppler told the AJC.
For every college team and athlete whose seasons have been prematurely shutdown in recent days, the anguish of relinquishing dreams and aspirations has been painful. At Tech, Heppler’s team had the most to lose. Consistently the best team on campus, these Yellow Jackets harbored legitimate national championship hopes, anchored by U.S. Amateur champion Andy Ogletree.
“I fully believe we were going to (win the NCAA title),” Heppler said in a highly atyp- ical public declaration of confidence. “Not that we’re much better than everybody else. I just think they had the mindset that we were going to.”
Heppler had the pieces, certainly. Besides Ogletree, reigning champion of the world’s most prestigious amateur tournament, Heppler had two other deco- rated seniors pulling the sled. Luke Schniederjans, a threetime All-ACC selection, and Tyler Strafaci, a two-time AllACC pick and a past qualifier for the U.S. Open, were the other two.
The Jackets were ranked No. 3 in the coaches poll and seventh by Golfstat. Their four tournament wins were tied for the most nationally. Tech was bolstered by Ogle- tree’s decision to pass on invitations to play in multiple PGA Tour events — honors for being the U.S. Amateur champion — in order to compete with his team.
“It’s been about his two senior friends (Schniederjans and Strafaci) and the program,” Heppler said. “I can do nothing but salute him for his loyalty.”
Since Heppler’s hire in 1995, Tech has finished in the top eight at the NCAA championship 11 times — three times the runner-up — won or shared the ACC championship 13 times and produced three national players of the year. The only prize that has eluded Tech is the national championship.
“As far as physical ability and mental ability and approach, the skill set, there was no doubt we could win the tournament,” Heppler said.
Then came Thursday. After the ACC’s decision to suspend competition and practice, Heppler called a meeting at the team’s practice facility. But just as Heppler arrived to address the team, another bomb dropped — the NCAA was canceling its spring championships.
Players were learning the news just before Heppler walked through the door.
“Just disbelief,” Heppler said. “They didn’t say very much.”
Heppler went from helping his team figure out how to make it through the hiatus to telling them how sorry he was that their dreams were, at the very least, deferred. few players shed tears. “Guys don’t want to be vu ln rable — you know that,” Heppler said. “But sometimes, you can’t help it. When you’ve invested all that into it, it’s hard to walk away. You just go, ‘Wow, I’ve been doing this every day waiting for this spring,’ and so it’s tough.”
The pain was even greater for Ogletree, who was to tee it up at the Masters, only to see that tournament get postponed, as well.
“It’s just kind of, there’s things in life, you just don’t believe are going to happen,” said Heppler.
Heppler’s senior trio will now face a decision on whether to return for a second try at a senior season — the NCAA will offer additional eligibility to springsports athletes — and postpone turning professional for a year. They may have to make a decision not knowing what their options will be with playing their way onto any of the professional tours, given that those circuits are suspended.
Ogletree has already made his decision, telling the AJC’s Steve Hummer on Tuesday he will not return upon his scheduled graduation in May.
“Obviously, there is going to be a new rule where you could possibly come back, but I’m not going to do that,” Ogletree said. “For me, this is it and it kind of sucks to go out this way when we had a great chance to win the national championship, I think.”