At the end of the 2022 season, Dublin Coffman golfer Luke Warner earned an Ohio Capital Conference honorable mention and landed in the top 20-some golfers in the state. For a sophomore, it was an impressive finish. And he’s just getting started.
Coming from the Sells Middle School golf team, Warner immediately gained attention for his chops on the fairway. He earned a spot on Coffman’s varsity golf team as a freshman, a rare feat for the highly competitive team.
“He’s a very good player,” coach Scott Sutherland says. “As a freshman, his length that he hits, it really helped him because usually what holds freshmen back – and sophomores, younger golfers – is they just can’t keep up with the distance of the older players,” he says.
Aside from technical skills, Sutherland says Warner is a great player to coach due to his outgoing personality and willingness to accept feedback to improve his skills.
“One thing I like about Luke is he likes to talk through a lot of golf shots with me and that’s not always the case,” Sutherland says. “Some golfers like to just stay to themselves, play their game.”
But his positivity on the course isn’t the only thing that gives him a competitive edge. Warner does his homework before he even picks up a club, often studying information about the course and the competition.
“You want to come into it with a game plan,” Warner says. “I’ll go on to Google Earth and kind of map out some yardages on there just to see what I want to hit off the tee, maybe see where I want to leave myself with layup shots and stuff like that.”
Still, Warner says he isn’t immune to the pressure of big tournaments. He says staying focused on the game is important to playing his best.
“It’s definitely mentally draining,” Warner says. “You’re out there for about four and a half hours playing in a tournament and you’re only hitting the ball for about 15 minutes of the four hours. So you really just have to stay present in the moment and just focus on your game.”
Warner says his first state tournament was particularly nerve-racking for him.
“I’ve never been in that environment,” Warner says. “Just all those people around the first tee watching, you getting your name called, and that big of a tournament – I’ve just never had that before.”
Changing His Swing
Warner didn’t always aspire to be a golfer. Up until this past season he was actually more interested in playing baseball. He played on the Coffman freshman baseball team and led in all offensive statistics with a batting average over .420.
After making the varsity golf team as a freshman and scoring competitively at meets and tournaments, Warner ultimately decided to quit baseball and focus on his golf career. He hopes to eventually play Division I golf in college.
“Golf, you can play it forever,” Warner says. “You can play like my great grandpa played it until he was, like, 85. So, baseball, I probably am not going to play college with it. I think in golf, I can play in college, and I think it’s just better for my future.”
Though his aspirations may be new, his interest in golf is not. Warner, who’s lived in Dublin his entire life, started playing golf at a young age. He got his first set of golf clubs at age 3 and started visiting courses at age 5.
His father, Justin Warner, is an avid golf player as well, and the family often takes trips to play around the country.
“We go to Florida every year, every spring break, I play down there,” he says. “Then in the summer, we go down south and learn and play. So it was really fun. Just to have that little break from baseball and play different games.”
In addition to playing on the Coffman golf team, Warner often practices three to four hours a day, four days a week during the offseason. This helps him improve his game and prepare for the regular high school season.
Dublin is known for a particularly competitive golf community – Coffman placed third in the state in 2021 and both boys and girls teams at Dublin Jerome have held multi-year state title streaks in recent times. Warner’s work ethic outside the regular season helps keeps him ahead of the curve.
He also participates in tournaments outside of Coffman golf, often playing in competitions two to three times a month. Looking forward, he hopes to maintain a scoring average of 75 in competitions and to qualify for the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship this year. As for the Coffman golf team, Warner hopes to help the team win the high school state championship tournament this season.
“I’m not really trying to beat (the other players), I’m trying to beat the course,” he says. “But there’s always that competitive spirit in me that wants to just do as best as I can against those people.”
Maisie Fitzmaurice is an editorial assistant at CityScene Media Group. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
