What’s going on w Stanford Men’s Golf?

golferdad8 · July 15

Stanford can’t seem to recruit or keep good student athletes!?! It feels like a lot of their recent five years’ recruits either transfer, get cut, and/or can’t contribute enough to consistently make the roster?

It can’t be the academics right? Everyone knows Stanford is known for massive grade inflation & is quite easy once students get in.

Tugu · July 15

1 hour ago, golferdad8 said:

Stanford can’t seem to recruit or keep good student athletes!?! It feels like a lot of their recent five years’ recruits either transfer, get cut, and/or can’t contribute enough to consistently make the roster?

It can’t be the academics right? Everyone knows Stanford is known for massive grade inflation & is quite easy once students get in.

They always had guys whose family name adorn the basketball stadium at a IVY league school or dad willing to write a big cheque. But in Thorbjorsen, Villips and P Rogers et al , they had vaunted players that could break ACTUAL par.

The current bunch rode the CCA to all kinds of accolades wothout winning much and have been found unable to break ACTUAL par when called upon to. One former all american this and accolade that even quit the program when he couldn't break 80 in sophomore year.

The biggest differentiating factor imho is that the current crop are for the most part "golf for college" entry kids. If they had missed at Stanford, they'd be just as happy at Harvard or Princeton.

Nothing wrong with golf for college entry kids, but for obvious reasons it doesn't make for elite performance "in golf." If one was to make MIT kids to devote themselves to golf over academics, their grades would accordingly suffer.

Edited July 15 by Tugu

jda · July 15

Personally coached two kids who went to Stanford, as well as one of my own having long talks with them when being recruited. The classes are legit. Super smart kids get 3.5s there. I would not look at academics - they will get you all the help that you need once you get in.

The culture of the athletic department changed after the admissions scandal and they are very rigid like they are always being watched - the school seems to clearly care about academics more than athletics and might have told the AD to never cross a line again (or get near the line.) Student > athlete. They did not used to have a lot of NIL money which is why some of their kids leave - most notably the softball pitcher who went to Texas Tech who flat out said that it was money. I would look more to culture and money and kids who are not there for mainly the degree might not care for it.

What was it called? Operation Varsity Blues?

golferdad8 · July 15

1 hour ago, jda said:

Personally coached two kids who went to Stanford, as well as one of my own having long talks with them when being recruited. The classes are legit. Super smart kids get 3.5s there. I would not look at academics - they will get you all the help that you need once you get in.

You might be right about the golf portion, but I can tell you for a fact that Stanford is an easy easy school (unless going pre-med), which none of the guys are doing.

In fact, from my b-school, all the stanford undergrads had 3.9+ GPA - just like today. Nothing has changed since Varsity Blue, other than Stanford will only take admissions risk for $10M+. Exhibit A is incoming recruit who might be the weakest (& lowest ranked) golfer Stanford has recruited in 15 years).

Tugu · July 15

1 hour ago, golferdad8 said:

Stanford will only take admissions risk for $10M+. Exhibit A is incoming recruit who might be the weakest (& lowest ranked) golfer Stanford has recruited in 15 years).

What about the guy whose family name adorns the basketball stadium of an IVY? Its a close race.😆

kekoa · July 15

I don't know what the story on CS is, but I guess he did in fact did commit to play golf for Stanford. I've seen him around a few high school golf matches against my son's team. He seems like a very nice kid and bombs it, but didn't think he was Stanford caliber when it comes to golf.

leezer99 · July 16

2 hours ago, kekoa said:

I don't know what the story on CS is, but I guess he did in fact did commit to play golf for Stanford. I've seen him around a few high school golf matches against my son's team. He seems like a very nice kid and bombs it, but didn't think he was Stanford caliber when it comes to golf.

6' 5" and 205 lbs... he better be able to bomb it even if he works with Monte.

jda · July 16

6 hours ago, golferdad8 said:

...Stanford will only take admissions risk for $10M+. Exhibit A is incoming recruit who might be the weakest (& lowest ranked) golfer Stanford has recruited in 15 years).

Might see more of this with athletic departments not knowing how they are going to pay for NIL and stuff. It always has been OK to have a donor's kid join a team, but they need to be on it and have it be above board. When I was at Mizzou, Stan Kroenke's kid got a spot with Quin Snyder's basketball team. He could play and was a legit walk on... and now he owns the Nuggets, Avalanche and Arsenal. Kroenke gave the whole some of like $80-100 million to build the new indoor arena on campus... named it after his daughter who then got kicked out of USC for cheating.

If the kid ever played the sport and is actually on the team, then you are good and always have been. Probably a bad idea to get a kid has never touched an implement of the craft in their life.

golferdad8 · July 16

5 hours ago, Tugu said:

What about the guy whose family name adorns the basketball stadium of an IVY? Its a close race.😆

Not sure on the Ivy hoops player - perhaps another story there.

At a current CA AJGA, the Stanford recruit just shot 80 during R1 & is 41st out of 51 golfers. In 18 holes, he is already 12 strokes behind the leader, a 2026 Yale commit, placing him 41st place out of 51. We shall see what happens when he starts school, but at this rate I don’t think he would make the roster at an Ivy, let alone at Stanford.

https://www.ajga.org/tournaments/2025/rg-golf-junior-championship/leaderboard

Edited July 16 by golferdad8
Typo

leezer99 · July 16

16 minutes ago, golferdad8 said:

Not sure on the Ivy hoops player - perhaps another story there.

At a current CA AJGA, the Stanford recruit just shot 80 during R1 & is 41st out of 51 golfers. In 18 holes, he is already 12 strokes behind the leader, a 2026 Yale commit, placing him 41st place out of 51. We shall see what happens when he starts school, but at this rate I don’t think he would make the roster at an Ivy, let alone at Stanford.

https://www.ajga.org/tournaments/2025/rg-golf-junior-championship/leaderboard

Saticoy will do that to you.

leezer99 · July 16

That's pretty cold for Stanford to name your replacement the same day you commit to another school.

WAGR: 562 (best 397)

Rolex: 280

TUGR: 26th overall

BallsBreakFast · July 16

Can't be a school, academic or administration thing as otherwise the womens team would have equally stumbled. Must either be their recruiting methodology and evaluation, or how they run the men's program.

jda · July 16

12 hours ago, BallsBreakFast said:

Can't be a school, academic or administration thing as otherwise the womens team would have equally stumbled. Must either be their recruiting methodology and evaluation, or how they run the men's program.

This is rarely true, IME. Having coached both M&W golf, basketball, softball and baseball, more young ladies go to college for the degree and golf/softball are WAY behind the academics. The boys tend to think that they are more special and need to dominate a game or try and be a pro, as a whole.

Coach has been there for over 20 years. I doubt that he forgot what he is doing or is not smart enough to adapt to the new landscape of male athletes - he has adapted before. My guess is that he is doing exactly what the administration wants of him.

ATXGolferGuy · July 17

On 7/15/2025 at 7:40 PM, golferdad8 said:

Not sure on the Ivy hoops player - perhaps another story there.

At a current CA AJGA, the Stanford recruit just shot 80 during R1 & is 41st out of 51 golfers. In 18 holes, he is already 12 strokes behind the leader, a 2026 Yale commit, placing him 41st place out of 51. We shall see what happens when he starts school, but at this rate I don’t think he would make the roster at an Ivy, let alone at Stanford.

https://www.ajga.org/tournaments/2025/rg-golf-junior-championship/leaderboard

Didn't that player shoot 67 today for low round of the day and is now sitting T11?

Don't judge a player by one round....shoot look at what JT did in the Players this year opening with a 78 and then shoots 62. Hell, Max Homa before the John Deer had just as many rounds above 72 as he had below 70 with 15 each.

Sometimes a kid will have a bad round or even a bad tournament or two in a row....doesn't mean they aren't worthy of being recruited by them. I don't know anything about the Stanford men's team, but I have to believe that you have to be able to play this game pretty well to get a look by The Cardinal. If they don't want to play the NIL game that's on them because it's not like there isn't anyone within a few miles of that campus that doesn't have some nickels to pitch in to a collective for their sports teams.

Tugu · August 1

https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/45875355/stanford-hiring-former-nike-ceo-john-donahoe-ad

Will this make a difference?

In the short term, their team of "golf for college" kids will mostly still shoot over par and MC. But maybe there will be a plan for golf in this new era of pay for play?

Or it'll be more over par scores via curated CV's from "golf for college" kids.