Oxford Reporter

The True Freshman: Patton Samuels Edition

Before arriving at Ole Miss for college, Patton Samuels knew Cameron Tankersley but didn't know Tom Fischer. Soon after arriving on campus, the trio became almost inseparable.

 

The three make up the true freshmen class for the 2022-23 Ole Miss men's golf team. Tankersley is from Dickson, Tenn., and Fischer is from Mountain Brook, Ala.

 

Samuels, a Clarksville Academy alumnus from Clarksville, Tenn., had an impressive prep career. He was ranked as the No. 2 recruit in the state of Tennessee for the high school class of 2022, won two TSSAA Division II-A state championships, and was 57th in the country in the Rolex American Junior Golf Association rankings.

 

His performances through those years drew attention from some colleges in the region.

 

"I talked to some schools. I didn't get recruited very heavily when I was a freshman or sophomore in high school. My junior and senior years, I started to play a little bit better," Samuels said.

 

"Mississippi State was involved. Arkansas was involved. I looked at UAB pretty heavily. I was never really recruited by Tennessee, so I looked out of state. It basically came down to Ole Miss and Arkansas."

 

These were the COVID years, and recruiting was certainly different. That was true for both players and coaches.

"Patton Samuels was playing well but didn't commit until going into his senior year of high school," head coach Chris Malloy said. "Players usually commit earlier. It was a crazy summer, very condensed from the recruiting aspect. He had a stellar junior career, but his junior year (of high school) didn't play great as we were getting out of COVID. He kind of had to redefine himself. Once we got to that summer coming out of COVID, he caught his true form again.

 

"He is a ball striker. Make no bones about it, that is his strength," Malloy continued. "In the fall (of 2022 at Ole Miss), he made a big leap with his short game and has shown more consistency in that area. That's really what allowed him to get into our lineup."

He earned a starting spot in two fall tournaments for the Rebels. He sank six birdies in his career debut in the Badger Invitational, and he had a standout first round at the Ka'anapali Classic, shooting 66. He finished tied for 22nd overall with a score of 208 (-5) to earn his best finish of the fall season and ended the fall with a 71.4 stroke average.

 

"Patton had some glimpses of being a really, really good player," Malloy said. "He's very consistent."

 

Patton, the son of Diana and Scott Samuels, agreed with Malloy on his strengths and what he does best.

 

"I've always been a pretty good ball striker. That's normally my strong suit," said Samuels, whose brother, Wyatt, played golf at Trevecca University and his father played baseball at Austin Peay State University. "I'm pretty solid off the tee. There's not a lot of days that I don't hit it decent off the tee.

That's where I really gain my strokes on the course.

 

"My putting is probably the biggest thing I need to work on. Speed, line, getting it all together. Some days I'll have good speed. Some days I'll have good line. I'm really working on getting all that together day in and day out."

 

Samuels said he is striving for more all-around consistency on a daily basis.

 

"Obviously everybody has a different path, a different swing thought," he said. "But one that I keep in my head day in and day out is just tempo. Just having the same smooth swing every time."

 

Samuels was a baseball player until his grandfather, Freddy Wyatt, took him to play golf.

 

"I was 11 or 12," he said. "I just fell in love with it. I like to say that I'm an individual-type person. I like to work by myself. So that's what really intrigues me about golf, how I was all alone and I could just do my own thing. I still played baseball for another year, and at that time my dad said 'If you want to play in college and at a high level, you probably need to pick one.' Some people may agree, some people may disagree. That's just what he told me. So I took up golf, and the rest is history."

 

Malloy said the trio of newcomers have already stepped up in a short amount of time.

 

"You don't normally have three true freshmen that come in and contribute in their first fall season like these guys have," Malloy said. "We have a pretty darn good team with a good mix of upperclassmen as well. We don't know what the spring holds for them, but I've been really impressed with what these three guys have done right out of the gate."

 

Samuels said choosing Ole Miss over Arkansas became obvious for a number of reasons.

 

"I was like, it's four hours away. Cam (Tankersley) is committed here. I like the coaches and they like me. So it just made sense. It felt like home as soon as I got here."

A major college golf opportunity was what Patton Samuels had hoped to have for a number of years. And he did.

 

"There was a lot of time and effort and practice in my junior career. You keep doing it, and you finally get the chance to commit and sign. You're like, 'It's here. This is what I was working for.' Now I'm working to get better and to another level."

 

He likes this year's Rebel team, the first he's been a part of, its competitiveness and tenacity.

 

"I definitely think we can go pretty far this year," Samuels said. "We're very competitive. That's probably the thing I like most about this team. It's competitive in a good way. I think that's what makes us good. It motivates you to keep moving forward."

Original source can be found here.