Chase Kyes’ mindset going into the U.S. Open qualifier in Atlanta was just like any other tournament.
"I think most freshmen in college don't anticipate making it to the US Open," Kerstin Kyes, Chase’s mother, says. "For Chase, it was more, ‘this will be good for me to go try it out, see how I do, and set my goals for the future.’"
Chase made the trip with a college teammate, without his parents alongside him this one time. Her husband has attended every tournament Chase has ever played. But this time, they got a text to the family group chat instead.
“He just said, 'I'm in.' We were all screaming, jumping up and down. We were so excited," Kerstin says.
The scoreboard read 11 under. Word spread fast, and reporters found Chase before his parents could fully process what had happened.
When asked what he planned to do to prepare for the U.S. Open the following week, Chase said, "The US Open's next week?!"
"He absolutely had no clue," Kerstin says. "Everybody else going into it expected to make it, but I don't think he did. Of course he believes in himself, but 20 years old and beating all these pros to play in the second-biggest tournament in the world?!"
Where Chase grew up, being humble was nothing new.
"If you were to run into him at Greystone and say, 'Hey, I've heard you're pretty good at golf,' he'd say, 'Sometimes,'" Kerstin says.
Long before Atlanta, the Kyes family made the decision to move to Greystone.
"We got the club membership for Chase to make it easy for him to practice all day, every day, even before he could drive," Kerstin says.
The move put Chase on the course alongside players older than him.
"He always had someone to mentor him, someone to look up to, to perfect his game. He rarely golfs with kids his own age, and I think that helped him," Kerstin explains.
That environment built the golfer. It also helped build the person.
The week before the Open meant scrambling to arrange housing and flights, plus a caddy and sponsorship support through the agency Chase had signed with that summer. But what mattered to him was routine.
Kerstin recognizes it as exactly the discipline that got him there.
The family kept every detail of tournament week as ordinary as they could manage, down to what Chase ate.
That same need for normalcy showed up on a quiet golf course on a cold Sunday night, before a single practice round had officially started.
"We were the only ones out there practicing," Kerstin said. "The stands were empty, the sun was setting, and it was just me, my husband, Chase, and his caddy. He was reading the greens and hitting shots and talking about his game."
Kerstin says he’s just a kid who loves golf.
Chase didn't make the cut. For a freshman playing against the best professionals in the world, two rounds at a U.S. Open was an extraordinary accomplishment, but the outcome still wasn’t what he wanted.
On their last day with tournament passes still in hand, Kerstin asked what he wanted to do. He wanted to go back to the course and watch.
They walked it together that afternoon, Chase narrating shots and reading greens for a mother who had spent two decades cheering from the sidelines of a game she didn't fully know.
Near the end of the day, they found a spot along the 18th green as the leaders came through, the grass moving in the wind and the light dropping behind the hole.
"The sun was setting right beyond the green, and Chase put his arm around me," Kerstin said. "He said, 'Don't worry, Mom. We'll be back here. And I'm going to win this whole tournament, and you're going to watch it.'"
Twenty years of packed schedules and sacrificed vacations led to that sunset.
"We never lived vicariously through our kids," she said. "But to see them flourish in their passion, and to know you did everything you could to support them, that's a gratifying feeling."
Chase returns to Tennessee this fall for his sophomore season, and to Greystone whenever he's home, still full of people who have known him since before he could walk.
Whatever comes of his promise on that 18th green, his mother is proud to know that the person Chase is was built long before Atlanta, but back home.