FORT WORTH, Texas — Colonial Country Club,
Friends of Golf (FOG), and the Golf Coaches
Association of America (GCAA) have announced
that five seniors, two juniors, and three
sophomores comprise the 10 semifinalists for
The Ben Hogan Award, the most prestigious
award in men’s college golf.
The Ben Hogan Award is presented annually to
the top men’s NCAA Division I, II or III, NAIA or
NJCAA college golfer taking into account all
collegiate and amateur competitions during the
12-month period dating from the previous
award’s banquet. The Ben Hogan Award
Selection Committee is made up of 25 leaders
and experts in amateur, college and professional
golf.
In alphabetical order, the semifinalists are:
Gavin Green
(New Mexico)
Beau Hossler
(Texas)
Kyle Jones (Baylor)
Lee McCoy
(Georgia)
Maverick
McNealy (Stanford)
Cheng-Tsung
Pan (Washington)
Jon Rahm (Arizona
State)
Ollie
Schniederjans (Georgia Tech)
Robby Shelton
(Alabama)
Hunter Stewart
(Vanderbilt)
This is the first time since 2005 that 10 different
schools are represented on the semifinalist list.
Pan, Schniederjans and Shelton are semifinalists
for the second straight year, and Pan is the first
golfer ever to be a four-time semifinalist.
On Wednesday, May 6, the list of 10
semifinalists will be pared down to three
finalists. The three finalists will attend a black-
tie banquet at Colonial Country Club in Fort
Worth, Texas, on Monday, May 18, where the
winner will be crowned.
The award, which was first issued in 1990 and
included academic achievement in its original list
of standards, revised its criteria for the 2001-02
collegiate season to its current standard of
honoring the outstanding amateur collegiate
golfer prior to the start of the PGA TOUR’s
Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial.
Since that time, the winners have been: D.J.
Trahan (Clemson, 2002), Ricky Barnes (Arizona,
2003), Hunter Mahan (Oklahoma State, 2003),
Bill Haas (Wake Forest, 2004), Ryan Moore
(UNLV, 2005), Matt Every (Florida, 2006), Chris
Kirk (Georgia, 2007), Rickie Fowler (Oklahoma
State, 2008), Kyle Stanley (Clemson, 2009),
Nick Taylor (Washington, 2010), Peter Uihlein
(Oklahoma State, 2011), Patrick Cantlay (UCLA,
2012), Chris Williams (Washington, 2013) and
Patrick Rodgers (Stanford, 2014).
Notable semifinalists over the years include:
Jonas Blixt (Florida State), Bud Cauley
(Alabama), Kevin Chappell (UCLA), Harris
English (Georgia), Ches¬son Hadley (Georgia
Tech), Brian Harman (Georgia), Russell Henley
(Georgia), Dustin Johnson (Coastal Carolina),
Anthony Kim (Oklahoma), Scott Langley
(Illinois), Spencer Levin (New Mexico), Webb
Simpson (Wake Forest), Jordan Spieth (Texas),
Michael Thompson (Alabama), Camilo Villegas
(Florida) and Nick Watney (Fresno State).
For more information on The Ben Hogan Award,
visit
The
BenHoganAward.org and follow
@Be
nHoganAward on
Twitter.
Notes About the Semifinalists
• The Ben Hogan Award semifinalist group
includes five seniors, two juniors and one
sophomore.
• This is the first time since 2005 that no
teammates are among the semifinalists, as 10
different schools are represented.
• The Pac-12 Conference and Southeastern
Conference tied for the most semifinalists with
three apiece. It is the fourth straight year that
the Pac-12 has had the most semifinalists.
• Three of the 10 semifinalists are foreign-born:
Gavin Green (Malaysia), Cheng-Tsung Pan
(Taiwan) and Jon Rahm (Spain).
• Three of the 10 nominees (Cheng-Tsung Pan,
Ollie Schniederjans and Robby Shelton) are
semifinalists for the second straight year.
• Washington’s Cheng-Tsung Pan is the first
player ever named as a semifinalist four years.
• Alabama has had at least one semifinalist in
eight consecutive years (Michael Thompson-
2008; Bud Cauley-2009, 2010, 2011; Justin
Thom¬as-2012, 2013; Bobby Wyatt-2013, 2014;
Robby Shelton-2014, 2015), which is the longest
active streak in the country.
• Other schools with active semifinalist streaks
are Stanford (6), Washington (4), Georgia (2)
and Georgia Tech (2).
• Three schools with 2015 semifinalists
(Georgia-Chris Kirk, Washington-Chris Williams
and Stanford-Patrick Rodgers) have previously
had Ben Hogan Award winners.
• Hunter Stewart is the first semifinalist in
Vanderbilt history.
• In the amateur rankings, the list features the
top four players in the World Amateur Golf
Rankings and six are among the WAGR’s top 12.
It also includes six of the top seven players in
the Scratch Players World Amateur listing.
• In the college rankings, the list includes nine of
the top 10 players in the Golfstat rankings as
well as nine of the top 10 in the
Golfweek/Sagarin individual rankings.