Osiregbeme Egbakhumeh, far right, with a group of his fellow Pathway Discover interns.
courtesy Osiregbeme Egbakhumeh
SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. — Everybody as ASU (Alabama State University) knows — how do we say this in a gentle way? — that Osiregbeme Egbakhumeh is a little . . . different. Consider his get-to-know-me info sheet on the ASU golf team’s website. When asked for his favorite class, the dude listed . . . Pre-Calculus!
“Yes, they made fun of me,” Osime, said Tuesday afternoon in a phone interview, speaking of his fellow Hornets. He is 20, a native Nigerian, a rising junior at Alabama State and an intern in an ongoing 10-day USGA internship program called Pathways Discover, which gives college students from all walks of life, and sometimes unexpected ones, a crash course in this-is-how-we-do-it USGA fun. (This training comes in the wake of the initiation of Pathways Launch, which kicked off at the U.S. Women’s Open at Riviera earlier this month with 24 students starting a three-month internship program.)
But Osime is likely to have the last laugh here, at the Alabama State campus in Montgomery and way beyond it. For one thing, he’s a computer information systems science major — mad math skills required! Also, Osime’s favorite golfer (in a three-way tie with Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy) is Bryson DeChambeau, the two-time U.S. Open winner and, before leaving SMU to turn pro, a physics major. DeChambeau surely knows, as Osime notes with casual ease, that calculus is the study “of change and motion.” Well, what is golf if not change and motion? The change and motion of the backswing versus the downswing, Osime explained, along with the launching of a golf ball, optimizing spin rates and all the rest.
Osime has found a practical application for his studies. As a freshman, his stroke average was just over 79. As a sophomore, he cut two shots off it. Who knows what his junior year will bring? He loves watching DeChambeau’s YouTube videos in which he tries to break course records on his first visit to a golf course. “I enjoy seeing how he processes the challenges the course presents,” Osime said. There’s a wonderful and uncommon formality to his speech.
Osime grew up in Lagos, the economic capital of Nigeria and one of the most crowded cities in the world, with a population well over 15 million. His father is a lawyer, and his mother is a former bank employee. (He described his family as middle class.) He graduated from high school with a stellar GPA, as the captain of his track team, the co-captain of his soccer team — and the only golfer in his class of about 80 students.
At 16, Osime started dreaming about going to an American university. He offered a profile of himself on a portal for students from across the world trying to find their way to America. Quincy Heard, the golf coach at Alabama State, an historically Black university, started recruiting Osime via the magic of the internet and modern global communication, with its uncanny ability to shrink the world. No senior spring college tour for Osime. The first time he came to the United States was to matriculate at ASU.
He’s loving life here. As part of the Pathway program, Osime is one of about two dozen young people who, starting last week, have been working behind the scenes at this U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills. Osime is working in the ticketing office. After several days here last week, the whole gang boarded a bus and went to New York City for a couple of nights, staying in Times Square and seeing the sights.
Osime taking in the Big Apple sights. courtesy Osiregbeme Egbakhumeh
On Tuesday afternoon, Osime kindly made himself available for this GOLF.com interview as the group prepared itself for a trip to Yankee Stadium to see Judge and the boys take on the Chicago White Sox. Then the interns will return to Long Island and Shinnecock Hills, staying in dorms at the Southampton campus of Stony Brook University.
Osime is aware of Nigerian golfers trying to make it in professional golf, including Francis Epe, trying to make it to the DP World Tour, and Georgia Oboh, trying to make it to the LPGA tour. Osime, since coming to the United States, has had access to new clubs and practice facilities in ways he did not at home. So where is this young man going? Does he want to get better at golf? Yes. Does he want to have an impactful business career? Yes. Is he looking forward to Sunday afternoon when he and all the other Pathway interns will get a break and able to hike Shinnecock’s hills and take in the golf?
Michael Bamberger writes for GOLF Magazine and GOLF.com. Before that, he spent nearly 23 years as senior writer for Sports Illustrated. After college, he worked as a newspaper reporter, first for the (Martha’s) Vineyard Gazette, later for The Philadelphia Inquirer. He has written a variety of books about golf and other subjects, the most recent of which is The Second Life of Tiger Woods. His magazine work has been featured in multiple editions of The Best American Sports Writing. He holds a U.S. patent on The E-Club, a utility golf club. In 2016, he was given the Donald Ross Award by the American Society of Golf Course Architects, the organization’s highest honor.
