Virginia Golfer May / Jun 2020 | Page 24

“ I’ve been playing a lot of golf because it’s pretty much all there is to do. —Peter Gasperini of Radford University. “ from VWU to ODU, so he is working on finding out if he will be brought back for the 2021 season. If he is, he will adjust his class schedule so he takes 12 credits in the fall and then the minimum of three credit hours in the semester prior to graduation. “Mainly for me right now, I’m just trying to get all the academic stuff straight to make sure I have enough credits to be eligible,” he explained. “I’m hoping within the next couple of weeks, I can get more of a clear cut answer on whether I will be back for next fall or not.” CASE BY CASE If Gasperini, a two-time VSGA Amateur semifinalist, and Morgan, who qualified for last year’s U.S. Amateur and won the VCU Invitational last fall, are playing for a college golf team next season, that would be quite a recruiting haul for any team to add to the returning players and incoming freshmen. “You’re going to see some isolated situations where you’re going to have some really strong teams if they can afford that piece,” said Hetzel, a finalist in last year’s VSGA Women’s Amateur. “I think there’s a big misunderstanding by just average college sports fans of where scholarships come from. Scholarships are endowments—that’s donated money—so it’s up to the universities, to the athletic departments to be able to pay for those. “It’s going to require a lot of creativity quite honestly to figure out how to accommodate those seniors going forward. We have some players who I would love to have for another year and would absolutely accommodate the same amount of scholarship they’re on. I’ve got some other players, they know I love them and I’m going to miss them, but it might be just time for them to move on. It’s going to be a case-by-case situation. “With this extra year for everybody, four years from now, you’re still going to see student-athletes competing across all spring sports that they’ll have some type of corona story, if you will.” STAYING SHARP Morgan, Gasperini, and other golfers across the state are finding ways to stay in golf shape for whenever events resume. Most golfers at state institutions were planning on participating in VSGA events over the summer, and those events— including all VSGA championships, One- Day Events, Junior Golf Circuit events and education events have been postponed through at least the end of May. CHRIS LANG 22 V IRGINIA G OLFER | M AY/J UNE 2020 vsga.org