Welcome to The Opening Tee Shot

Hello and I hope you're enjoying this first day of October. It's hard to believe we're down to the last 90 days of the 2025 — yet here we are whether we're ready or not.

Last week we were up in Long Island as we watched our son compete in the Junior Ryder Cup. To say it was an amazing experience would be an understatement and the fact the junior USA team won was the icing on the cake. I share more about our experience below.

First though, I want to continue the discussion on rankings and the role they're playing in junior golf. It's clear from the responses I received that this is a topic of great importance to many of us, so we'll keep exploring it. This week, I'm featuring the perspective from a former coach and from Junior Golf Scoreboard, plus a new article. Time to dive in!

-Sara and Chili

🕰️ A follow up on rankings

I sent out my advice on navigating rankings as a parent a couple of weeks ago in the newsletter. Keep in mind, I'm not a coach or advisor, but I completely understand how essential — and maddening — rankings can feel like.

If you need a refresher, I've shared my thoughts on this topic and posted it as an article on the JGP website, which you can find here.

I also heard from Mac Thayer, who is the Founder of Junior Golf Scoreboard. He offered a fantastic perspective that I wanted to share with you.

Mac advises us as parents to also look at class rank. He pointed out a critical component to recruiting, which is that coaches recruit by year and that is their data point. Not only that number but what percentile is that in their class. For example, being 40^th out of 800 is better than 30^th of 475. Systems are often ranking a different number of players per class.

As a parent of someone who was recently recruited to play college golf, I 1,000% understand what Mac is referring to and how important rankings are within the class. So keep this in mind when you're looking at the numbers.

📰 New article on the JGP website!

I'm excited to share we have another new article on the Junior Golf Playbook website, this one written by Michael Burcin, the owner of Under Par Consulting. 

In this blog, Michael shares his words of wisdom for us as parents on important Dos and Don'ts on and off the golf course. He shares his incredible knowledge not only as a former D-1 college golf coach, but as a parent himself. You can check it out here.

🏆 The Junior Ryder Cup experience

It's hard to describe how incredible it was experiencing the Junior Ryder Cup. I think team events are so refreshing and such a fun break away from the grind of individual golf. 

While watching all of these junior golfers was inspiring, what I was most surprised by was how much I enjoyed spending time with the other parents. Many of us are in the same boat and getting ready to send them off the college. 

I also can't speak highly enough about Nassau Country Club. The facilities were top notch and the staff was so accommodating. Hamilton loved playing the course and it was quite challening. This was a memory for the books, that's for sure!

Here are a few pics from last week for you!

The opening ceremony at Nassau Country Club in Long Island

A closeup view of the trophy, which is staying here in the USA!

A top secret look at the team room inside Nassau Country Club 😆

The view overlooking the range during a warmup session. The weather was picture perfect until Thursday, when the rain came in.

The USA team celebrating their victory over the Europeans. We were hoping it would translate into a U.S. win for the pros, but we all know how that one turned out!

Thank you to UP Consulting for your continued support as a sponsor and drop us a line if you're interested in affordable sponsorship opportunities with Junior Golf Playbook.

Do you know another junior golf parent who would like this newsletter? You can send this link.

Don't forget, you can always hit reply to this newsletter or email us at sara@juniorgolfplaybook.com.

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