While fans around the golf world are rooting for Dustin Johnson, Tiger Woods or Rory McIlroy in this week’s Masters at Augusta National, the Owensboro Catholic family and the community as a whole only have one name on their mind.
John Augenstein.
The former Ace standout sits at -3 after the second round of his debut at Augusta as he’s poised to make the cut in just his second major.
For his former coach Bretnea Turner, it’s been a wild time leading up to this week.
“Knowing that the Masters was coming up, honestly, there’s just a little bit of an air of excitement, especially this week,” she said. “People saying are we going to be watching it and different administrators, especially our principal, who’s known John his whole life, since he was a little kid. His son and John played tee ball together so there’s just this kind of understanding that all of us are into golf, all of us know golf, we all watch the Masters anyway and now somebody that we know is going to be right in the spotlight.”
Owensboro Catholic principal Gates Settle said he too has been looking forward to this week.
“John and my son Isaac have been good friends since before preschool and seeing him grow and progress as he has is not surprising,” Settle said. “He was always very driven to be successful in golf and he had the will to succeed, even at a very young age. Everyone at OCHS is so proud and excited for him today and how he represents Catholic High and the city of Owensboro.”
Turner said it’s been thrilling this week to see Augenstein on the main stage but she did have to relay what the Masters were to many students during the last couple of days.
“Kids don’t know what the Masters is because they don’t follow golf,” she said. “They’re like ‘I’ve heard of the Masters. Where is that?’ What do you mean where is that?”
Turner said she grew up around golf and many of her colleagues at OC are the same.
“We have a group message at work going with several people that know John, follow John, like golf, play golf,” she said. “We were like ‘Oh no, he had a triple’ or ‘he came back with a birdie.’’ Just following him all day and we did it yesterday as well.”
When she sees the success Augenstein has had since leaving the halls of Catholic, she said she can’t help but get emotional.
“Kids have so much potential,” she said. “Some kids have way more than others and when they have that much potential, you can only hope that they realize it and do something with it. It’s kind of a perfect storm when they actually do. They have to realize it, they have to have the resources or at least find the resources to help create it and cultivate it. Then they have to be put in certain positions and then they have to perform in those positions.
“John has practiced his butt off his whole life and made it to college, that was such a monumental moment getting to go to Vandy. When he won the state tournament his junior year, he’s had performances on big stages before that are relative to how old he was at the time.”
Turner said the feeling has been a whirlwind around the school as they’ve all gotten to see Augenstein’s rise from his early days as an Ace.
“The realization of him playing in the Masters was mind-blowing,” she said. “Then all the tournaments he got into for being runner-up in the U.S. Amateur.”
She said it’s almost become casual with many teachers knowing Augenstein as they’ll dip their head in a classroom and ask how he’s doing.
But, Turner said she does remember the moments that made Augenstein who he is.
“It’s really just such a surreal experience to not just know a kid but know a kid,” she said. “To be on the bus with him. To remember his mini blowups in high school. When he got an eight on the first hole at Hancock County.”
She said while some have a preconceived notion of how the Commodore star is, they don’t know what he’s done to get to the level he is currently.
“To know John is to respect John and to respect John is to love John,” she said. “He just has these qualities that at face value, he seems cocky and arrogant and too good, all the bad qualities. But when you know him a little bit deeper and you understand where those come from, it’s this deep drive and passion he has for this game. You just come to know it and you come to love it and you come to respect it.
“Getting to watch him tee off at the Masters, I was tearing up watching his shots.”
Turner said she’s known Augenstein was special for a long time but it wasn’t until he was in Nashville that she thought he could be really special.
“That was probably the first realization of it, watching him succeed in college,” she said. “Then the validation of that feeling came at the U.S. Amateur. Watching him play among all these people and gut it out.”
Turner said it’s a good feeling to know she had a part in the progression of Augenstein, even if it’s just a small part, but she added he’s helped her as well.
She said he realized from a young age what he needed to succeed.
“Even in high school, John had a swing coach at Olde Stone, he had his dad, who has an unbelievable mental game for golf,” she said. “He had mental health coaches, even in high school and those were things he sought out.”
Augenstein will hit the course Saturday for the third round of the Masters at Augusta and while he won’t be able to hear the roar from roughly 525 miles away in Owensboro, he knows his hometown has his back no matter what.
