CHRIS LANG ( 2 ) |
As the Roanoke Valley Golf Hall of Fame was preparing for its 2023 selections , it was pretty clear who this year ' s inductees would be . Ballots were cast and the choices of Darrell Craft and Matt Chandler were virtually unanimous .
“ If I ' m truthful about it , I had a feeling I ' d probably go into the Hall of Fame at some point ,” said Chandler , who was 40 . “ I didn ’ t know it would be this quick .”
He will be inducted but he won ' t take part in the ceremonies . When Chandler took ill on the morning of June 1 , his girlfriend returned from a pharmacy to find he was no longer breathing and had passed away .
“ He was kind of my go-to partner ,” said Brandon LaCroix , scheduled to play in a
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Matt Chandler and Brandon LaCroix partnered to with two VSGA Four-Ball titles .
four-ball event with Chandler later that weekend . “ That was at Hunting Hills and we were scheduled to tee it up Saturday and Sunday , and I got the news that he passed Thursday morning .”
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“ I didn ' t have any desire to go out there without him . I had a missed a call from him an hour before he passed . I was in a meeting . I didn ' t call him back . I don ' t know what the conversation would have been about , but I know he was very sick for a day or two .”
Chandler grew up in Franklin County and had some of his earliest golfing ventures at Willow Creek , a nine-hole public course in Rocky Mount , where a celebration of his life was held on June 7 .
As Chandler ' s game progressed , while he was teenager , he gravitated to The Water ’ s Edge at Smith Mountain Lake , where the head golf pro was Ed Curran . According to LaCroix , Chandler won the VSGA Junior Match Play title when he was 14 years old playing against 17 and 18-year-olds .
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