Golf at the Top Colleges

Golf is a sport played in the NCAA at many of the highly selective colleges. Overall, 47 of the 61 highly selective colleges have men’s golf teams and 43 of the 61 highly selective colleges have women’s golf teams with a total of 870 golf players across both genders.

Of the 47 colleges with men’s golf teams, 26 of them belong in Division 1 with 269 players and 21 of them belong in Division 3 with 250 players, totaling 519 players together in the 2021/2022 season.

Of the 43 colleges with women’s golf teams, 23 of them belong in Division 1 with 188 players and 20 of them belong in Division 3 with 163 players, totaling 351 players together in the 2021/2022 season.

The athlete recruitment process for golf at the highly selective colleges will generally follow practices based on whether the college belongs in Division 1 or Division 3, and will be subject to the NCAA rules for golf athlete recruitment for women or for men.

Golf is played at 75% of the highly selective colleges, with the the majority of women’s golf teams averaging 8 players, and men’s golf teams averaging 11 players representing athletes from freshmen, sophomore, junior and senior years of college. This means that each college recruits no more than 2 or 3 golfers per gender every year. The collective athlete recruitment opportunity in golf to the highly selective colleges approximates about 92 to 138 athlete recruit positions for men annually and about 86 to 129 athlete recruit positions annually for women.

According to the American Junior Golf Association, there are about 13,688 competitive junior golfers in the country who are ranked on the Junior Golf Scoreboard rankings. These rankings require that a golfer is either still in high school or has taken a gap year immediately following high graduation. Of these competitive golfers, 3,884 of them are women and 9,804 of them are men.

Golfers aiming to be recruited to a highly selective college are competing against the ranked golfers in their high school graduation year only.

Since the scoreboard spans a 4 year high school period, we estimate that in any given year, there are about 1,000 women competing for athlete recruit spots at a total of 727 colleges that play NCAA women’s golf, and there are about about 2,500 men competing for athlete recruit spots at 814 colleges that play NCAA men’s golf. Based on these numbers, we estimate that about 10% of women golfers and 5% of men golfers in any given year will be recruited to a golf team at a highly selective college.

The cost to nurture and train a junior golfer to the top ranks of junior golf is high, with estimates running between $40,000 a year to $60,000 a year over a multi year period. These costs include golf instruction that can range between $150 to $250 an hour, the costs of course practice plus the travel costs to golf tournaments around the country to obtain a golf ranking.

There are a needs based grants available to defray the costs of playing golf for young golfers aspiring to be golf athlete recruits to colleges. These include:

• the Ace Grant from the AJGA provides financial assistance to young men and women golfers who aspire to play golf at college

• The First Tee grants from the USGA provides grants to make golf more accessible to young people. The First Tee College Scholarship program provides need and merit-based scholarships of up to $5,000 a year to young golfers

• PGA Reach for golf beginners

• Youth on Course provides access to 2,000 golf courses throughout the country to young golfers for $5 or less per round of golf.

Remember that every junior golfer aspiring to be athlete recruited to a highly selective college must also meet the academic standards set by the college.

Read about

Women’s Golf NCAA Rules and Calendar for Athlete Recruitment

Men’s Golf NCAA Rules and Calendar for Athlete Recruitment

How do top colleges in Division 1 select their athlete recruits?

Athlete Recruitment to a Top NCAA Division 3 College

List of Highly Selective Colleges that Play Golf

Below is a list of the top colleges that play golf and the NCAA Division they belong in.

All data is compiled directly from the colleges’ athletic websites

Golf at Highly Selective Colleges
		Men's	Women's
	Division	Golf	Golf
Amherst College	III	Yes	Yes
Babson College	III	Yes	No
Barnard College (comb w/ Columbia University)	I	No	Yes
Bates College	III	Yes	Yes
Boston College	I	Yes	Yes
Boston University	I	No	Yes
Bowdoin College	III	Yes	Yes
Carleton College	III	Yes	Yes
Carnegie Mellon University	III	Yes	Yes
Claremont McKenna College (incl Harvey Mudd)	III	Yes	Yes
Colby College	III	Yes	No
Colgate University	I	Yes	No
Columbia University (incl Barnard College)	I	Yes	Yes
Cornell University	I	Yes	No
Dartmouth College	I	Yes	Yes
Davidson College	I	Yes	No
Duke University	I	Yes	Yes
Emory University	III	Yes	Yes
Georgetown University	I	Yes	Yes
Georgia Institute of Technology	I	Yes	No
Grinnell College	III	Yes	Yes
Hamilton College	III	Yes	Yes
Harvard University	I	Yes	Yes
Harvey Mudd College (comb w/Claremont McKenna)	III	Yes	Yes
Middleburry College	III	Yes	Yes
Northwestern University	I	Yes	Yes
New York University	III	Yes	Yes
Pitzer College	III	Yes	Yes
Pomona College	III	Yes	Yes
Princeton University	I	Yes	Yes
Rice University	I	Yes	No
Stanford University	I	Yes	Yes
Swarthmore College	III	Yes	No
Tufts University	III	Yes	No
Tulane University	I	No	Yes
University of California Berkeley	I	Yes	Yes
University of California Los Angeles	I	Yes	Yes
University of Michigan	I	Yes	Yes
University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill	I	Yes	Yes
University of Notre Dame	I	Yes	Yes
University of Pennsylvania	I	Yes	Yes
University of Southern California	I	Yes	Yes
University of Virginia	I	Yes	Yes
Vanderbilt University	I	Yes	Yes
Vassar College	III	No	Yes
Villanova University	I	Yes	No
Wake Forest University	I	Yes	Yes
Washington and Lee University	III	Yes	Yes
Washington University in St. Louis	III	No	Yes
Wellesley College	III	No	Yes
Wesleyan University	III	Yes	Yes
Williams College	III	Yes	Yes
Yale University	I	Yes	Yes
Total Players		519	351

Watch out for the latest on

• How to get recruited to the golf team at a top college?

• Golf team profiles at the top colleges

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