His heart was pounding. Time, sweat, and tears were shed into the game. Andrew Tan was waiting to hear about his future in the sport.

After years of dedication to the game of golf, senior Andrew Tan decided to play college golf for the University of Louisville and join former Vandegrift Golf Coach, Matt Wernecke, who is now coaching there.

“Coach Wernecke was one of the main connections for me getting a spot on the Louisville team,” Tan said. “I really enjoyed my time when he was at Vandegrift, and I’m really 

excited to play for his team for 4 more years.”

Applying to colleges and waiting for their response was one of the most nerve wracking moments in Tan’s life. He found out he was accepted into Louisville a couple of weeks ago but committed back in July.

“I was happy and I knew it shouldn’t have been too hard to get into, but it was still a big relief to know that I was actually going to go there,” Tan said. “When I initially got my offer, I was very surprised because it was still pretty early in the recruiting process, and I didn’t expect to receive such a great offer so early on.”

Tan said that Louisville wasn’t his dream college but after looking more into the school, he realized there was a lot more that it offered than he initially thought. Other than Louisville, he only had a couple of options, two of which were University of Houston and University of California, Santa Clara.

“I’ll be the first generation to attend Louisville, but my dad went to Virginia State and my mom went to the University of Texas,” Tan said. “It’s interesting because I get to be a trailblazer for my family, but if nobody else goes then I can say I played golf at a really good school.”

One of Tan’s goals during college is to make the roster and compete in a couple tournaments during his freshman year. As far as college overall, he would like to be able to win a couple tournaments as a team and individually to place well in PGA Tour U and get status on a tour to continue his career after Louisville.

“The biggest goal for me is to be able to make a living off of either playing golf or working in the industry,” Tan said. “I would really like to play professionally and I think that four years at Louisville will be a great place to start.”

Tan credits part of his success to his friends at the course he plays on. However, he also believes that the work of an individual is just as important.

“It’s really a lot of hard work because you can have talent but it doesn’t really matter if you don’t work at it,” Tan said. “Anybody can get as good as they want as long as they have the willingness to work.”