When Hayden Buckley saw his ball land softly on the green a few feet from the hole, he had an inkling he might be on his way to a special round. Buckley called the shot, his second stroke of the second round of the Princeville Makai Invitational in October, “a complete accident.” The pin was tucked in a difficult spot, so Buckley aimed for the more accessible center of the green. The slightly off-target shot set him up for a birdie on the opening hole.

The birdies continued to pile up, and by the time he stepped to the tee at the par-5 18th hole, Buckley was on the verge of a career round. He was nine under par, well on his way to bettering the career-best round of 64 he had posted just a couple of weeks earlier. Buckley knocked his second shot on the green, leaving himself about 30 feet for eagle. Make it and he would shoot 61, the lowest round in Missouri program history.

That Buckley was even on the team would have seemed unlikely five years ago. He grew up splitting his time between the diamond and the course, not fully committing to golf until midway through high school. A native of Tupelo, Mississippi, he dreamed of teeing it up for Mississippi or Mississippi State — his father played baseball for the Rebels — but even after he helped lead Tupelo High to three straight state championships, was named all-state four consecutive years and “begged them to let me walk on,” neither school showed interest.

The home-state schools weren’t alone. Rice was the only Division I school that had offered Buckley. But Chris Harder, the head professional at Tupelo Country Club, reached out to Missouri coach Mark Leroux. Harder had played for Leroux when Leroux was the coach at Austin Peay, and Harder beseeched his former coach to take a chance on Buckley. Leroux acquiesced, inviting Buckley on an official visit before ever watching him play. He eventually offered him a spot on the roster.

Upon committing to Missouri, Buckley vowed not to forget how he had been snubbed by the in-state schools. “From that day, I just had to work a little bit harder than everybody,” he says. “I had to stay longer, I had to do more things at home over Christmas break or summer, I had to do that much more to get to where I wanted to be and to get to where I felt I needed to be for the team.”

That approach has led to slow but steady improvement throughout Buckley’s college career — until this season. After consistently contributing but never winning an event during his first three years as a Tiger, Buckley, a senior, has suddenly become dominant. In Missouri’s first tournament of the fall, the 15-team Turning Stone-Tiger Invitational in Verona, New York, Buckley notched his first victory. Two tournaments later, at the Bank of Tennessee Invitational, he picked up his second victory and tied the lowest 54-hole total in school history by shooting 17 under par. Two weeks later came the Makai Invitational.

Although Buckley didn’t realize the eagle putt on 18 was for the school record, he knew he was playing well, and he knew he didn’t yet have an eagle on the scorecard. He studied the line, stepped up to the ball and holed the putt. Only after his teammates went crazy did Buckley realize he had made program history. At 19 under par, he also broke the 54-hole scoring record he had tied in Tennessee while finishing second individually.

As the spring season approached, Buckley ranked second in the NCAA in average score to par, per GolfStat.com. He shot par or better in 11 of 12 rounds. And he is showing no signs of slowing down. After a more than two-month break from tournament play since the Makai Invitational, Buckley overcame a six-stroke deficit after three rounds at the New Year’s Invitational in St. Petersburg, Florida, in early January, ultimately winning in a playoff. It marked the second consecutive year he has won the amateur event. And in February at Mizzou’s first event of the spring season, Buckley birdied seven of his last 12 holes to fire a final-round 64 and claim individual honors at the Sun Trust Gator Invitational in Gainesville, Florida.

Leroux says Buckley has already cemented himself among the best two or three golfers in school history. So how did an unrecruited high school player get to this point? Leroux and Harder both credit Buckley’s work ethic, which they say is driven by his competitiveness.

“Hayden is so good because of what Hayden has done,” Leroux says. “He made himself better by 
taking every opportunity and resource that was available to him.”

And don’t be fooled by the demeanor. “His desire to win, it’s exceptional,” Harder says. “He’s the nicest kid, but he will want to rip your head off. He’ll quietly want to destroy you, but he’ll look right at you and smile with a nice Southern personality.”

Buckley believes his breakout season has resulted not from an adjustment to his swing or approach, but from increased maturity and confidence that has allowed him to learn how to fight through adversity. “If you look at rankings and you look at scores and you look at all the statistics, things have changed drastically, but not much has changed physically,” Buckley says.
While his swing may not have changed from last season, one thing has: his post-graduate plans. Buckley says he was initially on the fence about committing to the grueling process of trying to qualify for the PGA Tour. But after his fall success, Buckley says he will set aside at least five years to chase his dream of playing professionally.

Harder, who earned his own PGA Tour card after graduating from Austin Peay, believes Buckley has a chance to carve out a career as a tour professional. “He just keeps getting better and better and better and better,” Harder says. “There’s nothing to tell me that it would slow down. It can take him as far as he wants.”

Photos by Emil Lippe