When looking at the accolades that senior Luis Gagne has earned in his career as an LSU golfer, it takes about five minutes to read through them in their entirety:
2018 U.S. Open Low Amateur, Three-time PING Southeast All-Region Team (2016-2018), 2016 U.S. Amateur Quarterfinalist, 2016 Maui Jim Intercollegiate Champion, 2017 Second-Team All-SEC, 2018 Arnold Palmer Cup Participant and 2017-2018 and SEC First-Team, to name a few.
Gagne posted the second-lowest stroke average in a season at LSU with a score of 71.16, and had 22 rounds of even par or better.
“It’s been a great experience over the last few years I’ve definitely become a better player and I think coming here was a really good fit for me. I can’t wait to see what the next year holds,” Gagne said.
But what really stands out besides all of the achievements is that Gagne committed to playing four years at LSU while getting his degree, rather than turning pro.
Just last season, LSU freshman Jacob Bergeron decided to turn pro after one season.
This is becoming more and more common as young amateurs find that they can have more time to develop their game as professionals rather than as student-athletes.
Gagne has a differentapproach from most of the young amateurs today.
“I want to finish school, get that degree, and I just feel like there’s no rush to turn pro. It’s always going to be there,” Gagne said.
Gagne, who just turned 21, still has the prime of his career ahead of him, and while it’s become the norm to either skip college or only go for a few years, some of the greatest golfers of all time played college golf. Tiger Woods spent two years at Stanford, Phil Mickelson stayed all four ears at Arizona State and won three NCAA Championships and Jack Nicklaus played four years at Ohio State.
Gagne was born in Costa Rica but moved to the U.S. when he was 4 and grew up, like many aspiring golfers do, following the career of Tiger Woods.
“In golf, it has to be Tiger. I’m a big Tiger fan,” Gagne said.
But he had another influence, who also dominated the sport he played.
“In other sports, definitely Michael Jordan, I’m a big basketball guy and I liked Jordan a lot growing up,” Gagne said.
As for his goals this season, Gagne thinks he and the rest of the team have a great shot at making it to the NCAA championships. Last season, the Tigers made it to the Spokane Regional as the No. 1 seed but fizzled out in the final round of qualifying, finishing in sixth, just one place out from moving on to the NCAA Championships.
“I thought we had a really good team last year, and it was disappointing when we didn’t make to the (NCAA) Championships… I think we’re even better this year and we certainly want to make it past regionals this year,” Gagne said.
After he finishes his final year as a Tiger, Gagne plans to go pro, and what exactly that means, Gagne isn’t sure.
“I’m going to see what doors are open, whether it’s going to Europe or the Web.com. We’ll see,” Gagne said.