Player Highlights
Matt Atkins had won a Carolina Pro Series event in 2013, but in 17 Web.com Tour events last year, Atkins missed 14 cuts and earned less than $7,000. A week before the RSM Classic, he barely squeaked through Second Stage qualifying for this year’s Web.com Tour. Although still a bit weary from that experience, Matt Atkins shot a 67 in Monday-qualifying for the RSM, and his karma began to change. There was the courtesy car, a practice round with Stewart Cink and, most importantly, the lesson that he could play on the big stage: Matt Atkins had rounds of 70, 69, 67 and 73 to finish a respectable T63 in his PGA TOUR debut. The confidence boost in Georgia was followed by a T14 in the Web.com Q-School Finals and carried over into the new year. Matt Atkins had a T2 at the Club Colombia Championship in February, where the difference between himself and winner Sebastián Munoz was his missed six-foot birdie putt on the 72
nd hole. Two months later, the man who had struggled to make cuts in 2015 made his fifth consecutive cut of the season, a T4 at the Servientrega Championship in Cartagena, Colombia. Courtesy of his courtesy-car week last fall, Matt Atkins’ game has clearly discovered a new gear.
Personal Notes
Matt Atkins graduated from Apollo High School in Owensboro, Ky. in 2009. Earliest golf memory was playing with his dad for the first time, hitting a tee shot down the middle of the fairway and chasing after it to hit the next shot. Turned to golf knowing “every time you walk off the course you feel like you could have done better at something.”. Favorite course is Palmetto GC in Aiken, S.C. Favorite athletes are Steph Curry, Tim Tebow and LeBron James. Favorite pro teams are those that play in Philadelphia.
