would you do us a favor would you toss it to Alex for us yeah and we’re going to go back to you Alex well thank you Ricky listen I know you’re an Oklahoma State Sooner but we got a bit of history in the tournament this year we have three Michigan State Spartans in the field for the very first time and that includes Ashton McCullik you might not know that name but in 2023 he won the Canadian Amateur and then just back in May he graduated from MSU only to play in the US Open a couple weeks later how about that for a graduation gift well we caught up with Ashton to talk about what a ride it’s been so far to the start of his career ashton you didn’t grow up in this area but you have a lot of roots here with Michigan now um being a Michigan State grad you just graduated what in May was it i did yes how has this been last last couple months here for you it’s been super cool um like you said I didn’t grow up here um but I’d like to say I’m part of the Spartan family especially now being graduated um but spending four years here um and meeting so many people and get to know the Spartan family and so many Michiganers um is really cool to come out here and try to support that group um of people and try to play the best I can for them you’re going to be making your Rocket Classic debut on Thursday have you ever had a chance to play at the Detroit club at all i haven’t prior to this week um I heard so many great things about it and was excited to get out here um I came down to watch a teammate Troy Taylor play in the the John Shiplin on Sunday so I got to see it a little bit then and then I also obviously played a couple practice rounds and so far from what I see I love it and so you made your tour debut last year you played in the US Open as well and what’s the last just year been like in terms of just like where you’ve seen your biggest growth yeah I mean it’s really cool um I don’t necessarily see any growth like within my game um a lot of me as a person getting these opportunities that I’ve had um but it’s more um you know taking advantage of the opportunities that I’ve had i I got to qualify into the Canadian Open and qualify into the US Open and that was just a lot of u you know letting me know that I’m doing the right thing and then you’re also going to be competing with a couple other Spartans here in the field as well um have you been able to chat with them a little bit and uh pick their brains uh yeah I mean I played my practice round this morning with James Payatt um we were on the team together for a year um it was just like a college practice round we were both just joking around having fun as much as we have fun out there and we’re all buddies um I want to beat him just as bad as he probably wants to beat me um but yeah it’s definitely uh I’ll help him he’ll help me with certain things so yeah and I understand so you didn’t start playing the game until what 12 13 years old yeah 14 so you picked it up pretty recently all things considered do you feel like there’s still a lot of the game left in you to to continue to grow here i think that’s definitely something um I grew up playing other sports i grew up playing hockey primarily um so I think it’s just you have that competitive instinct um and the game still feels relatively new i’m not burned out yet um and love just grinding and trying to get better um just have that competitiveness in me now Ash is going to be joined by fellow Spartans Ryan Brem and James Pott he was teammates with Pat back at Michigan State just a couple of years ago so the green and white well represented here this weekend red
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