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The 25 Greatest College Golf Courses in America

October 19, 2023
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Yale's Seth Raynor/C.B. Macdonald design will undergo a full-scale renovation starting this fall.

LC Lambrecht

College courses, like municipal golf courses, are highly democratic environments that cater to a large, often novice demographic. Their primary purpose is to provide recreation and respite for students, faculty and alumni of all ages and skill sets. As with libraries, rec centers and quadrangles, they are enmeshed with the currents and curriculum of campus life, at once affordable and easily accessible. Many are tasked with achieving a dual purpose: to be easygoing and fun as well as stern architectural forums that can hone the skills of college golf teams, a nearly impossible task in the age of 200-yard 7-irons.

Colleges and universities operate their courses as campus amenities, often at a loss, so a certain scruffiness can be associated with their presentation that isn’t out of place with a clientele also known to be untidy and even, occasionally, under washed. It’s part of the charm. That doesn’t mean profound architecture doesn’t exist. As our ranking of the 25 Best College Courses in America demonstrates, the country’s top college layouts possess as much variety and regional personality as the colleges and universities.

Given their utilitarian intent, eligibility for the Best College Golf Courses ranking is based on direct affiliation with the school and ease of use for students and faculty. That means outstanding venues like Blessings in Fayetteville, Ark., and Karsten Creek in Stillwater, Okla., both members of Golf Digest America’s Second 100 Greatest Courses and home, respectively, to the University of Arkansas and Oklahoma State University golf teams, do not qualify because they’re not readily accessible (or affordable) to students and faculty. Wake Forest has a state-of-the-art practice facility at neighboring Old Town Club in Winston-Salem, N.C., but the club is not otherwise associated with the school. The same is true for the University of Texas Golf Club.

The magazine’s first ranking of America’s best college golf courses was published in 1982 in the book, 100 Greatest Golf Courses—And Then Some, by Golf Digest founder and editor-in-chief Bill Davis. The ranking was just five courses deep, the results based on a poll given to collegiate golf coaches. This ranking is based on Best-in-State data and a survey of our course-ranking panel. Four of the five courses listed remain among the country’s best, including the top course in this year’s ranking, Yale, the Alister MacKenzie-designed Ohio State University Scarlet Course (then No. 1), Stanford and Colgate University’s Seven Oaks course, designed by Robert Trent Jones.

Emphasizing variety, the 2023 ranking favors no architectural style or era. Many of the profession’s greatest architects are represented, from early practitioners like MacKenzie (twice), Donald Ross and William Flynn to Tom Doak, Jack Nicklaus, Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner, and Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw.

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Pete Dye's River Course at Virginia Tech is ranked among the top 10 of our new college courses ranking.

Pete Dye has four courses on the list, spanning 1965 to 2016. Seven courses, including the top four, were built before the end of World War II. Four others—Jimmie Austin Golf Club at the University of Oklahoma, Duke University Golf Club, Colgate’s Seven Oaks, the University of Michigan’s Radrick Farms Golf Course—opened between 1950 and 1970. Four were constructed in the 1990s, and 10 were built after 2000.

Several college courses have been re-engineered projects atop existing courses, including those at Indiana University, the University of Virginia and both of Purdue’s courses. The survey of courses includes nine-hole layouts—which the magazine’s Best-in-State and 100 Greatest rankings do not—topped by The Course at Sewanee in Tennessee, landing at No. 10.

One course to watch is the University of North Carolina’s Finley Golf Course, which finished just outside the rankings this year. Earlier this year, Davis Love III, with brother Mark and architect Scot Sherman, completed a transformation of the school’s old 1949 George Cobb design into something entirely different with five new holes, several others re-routed and the introduction of native love grass borders and other flora. It opens in October and could make a charge onto the next edition of our Best College Courses in America.

Yale is another course to keep an eye on. Though it can’t place higher in this ranking, the 1926 C.B. Macdonald and Seth Raynor design will undergo a major renovation by Hanse and Wagner at the end of the 2023 golf season that will address its shortcomings. Built on a rugged, rocky site with some of the largest and most notable examples of Macdonald’s “ideal holes” (Yale’s version of the par-3 Biarritz, playing over water, is his most dramatic, and holes like Cape and Alps, as well as the up-and-over par-5 18th, are similarly breathtaking), the course has never been presented to its potential and has historically struggled with conditioning. It’s one of golf’s sleeping giants, and the post-renovated Yale should solidify its status as the country’s best college course and possibly break into the 100 Greatest or Second 100 Greatest courses ranking.

Below you'll find our list of the Best College Golf Courses in America. We urge you to click through to each individual course page for bonus photography, drone footage and reviews from our course panelists. Plus, you can now leave your own ratings on the courses you’ve played … to make your case why your favorite should be ranked higher.

The 25 Greatest College Golf Courses in America:

1. Yale Golf Course
Private
1. Yale Golf Course
New Haven, CT
Yale has always been something of a sleeping giant. For a variety of reasons the course has rarely lived up to its full potential, either due to inconsistent conditioning or some ill-considered changes through the decades that moved the architecture off its brilliant 1926 C.B. Macdonald and Seth Raynor design. Given the handicaps, it's remarkable Yale has continued to be so breathtakingly profound. The Leviathan-sized golf course bulges with magisterial holes like the Road, Cape, Knoll and the world’s best Biarritz chiseled onto the rocky, tumbling site. Recently made public, it's one of the few places in the U.S. (notably alongside the Old White course at The Greenbrier) where the general public can experience true Macdonald/Raynor architecture. The sleeping giant is about to awaken as Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner will go to work on reestablishing the original hole concepts and upgrade turf and drainage following the 2023 season.
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2. Taconic Golf Club
Public
2. Taconic Golf Club
Williamstown, MA
Taconic dates back to 1896 and is the home course of the Williams College men’s and women’s golf teams. Routinely ranked inside the top 15 on our Best in State rankings, Taconic, located in a quiet village in the northwest corner of Massachusetts, closer to Albany than Boston, is a challenging parkland layout with beautiful views of the surrounding mountains. It was designed and built in the 1920s by the architecture team of Wayne Stiles and John Van Kleek with undisturbed holes that fan out across a wooded property. The western Massachusetts gem has hosted three different USGA championships: the 1956 U.S. Junior Amateur, 1963 U.S. Women’s Amateur and 1996 U.S. Senior Amateur. Gil Hanse has been making restorative modifications here since 2008.
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3. University of Michigan Golf Course
Public
3. University of Michigan Golf Course
Ann Arbor, MI, United States
3.8
62 Panelists
Alister MacKenzie’s University of Michigan Golf Course was one of just a handful of college courses when it opened in the early 1930s, and it has remained one of the country’s best at any university. A restoration by Michigan native Arthur Hills in the 1990s restored some bunker and green complexes to MacKenzie’s original intent. The scene at the Blue, as it’s often referred to, is also one of the best of any collegiate venue as it sits atop hilly terrain in the shadows of the Big House, the Wolverines’ famous football stadium.
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4. The Ohio State University Golf Club: Scarlet
Private
4. The Ohio State University Golf Club: Scarlet
Columbus, OH, United States
4
66 Panelists
Augusta National and Cypress Point architect Alister MacKenzie originally designed Ohio State’s Scarlet course in 1931, but he died in 1934 before construction began. After his death, Perry Maxwell oversaw the construction, though the course is still considered a MacKenzie layout. Jack Nicklaus returned to his collegiate course in 2005-2006 to restore the bunkers and lengthen the course to over 7,400 yards. The bunkers are some of the most penal in college golf, many massive in size and most with tall lips, often requiring high-lofted clubs to get back in play. The greens often play quite firm, making it difficult to hold approach shots close to some hole locations. The Ohio track regularly plays as one of the toughest courses on the Korn Ferry Tour when it hosts an annual event during the tour’s finals series. The course is semi-private and open to those who have an affiliation with Ohio State University.
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5. The Pfau Course At Indiana University
Public
5. The Pfau Course At Indiana University
Bloomington, IN, United States
College golf courses can be the most challenging of assignments for architects because of the need to accommodate the broad range of abilities that play the course day to day. On one hand the design needs to be enjoyable for students, faculty and local play, and on the other it has to have the mettle to test the skills of the best amateurs in the country. At Indiana, Smyers, a nationally competitive amateur player himself, has thought deeply about the topic. He challenges talented players, including the Hoosiers’ golf teams, with length, subtly angled drives, compressed landing areas bordered by light rough and contouring slopes around the edges of greens. But the course is also broad where handicap players drive the ball, the greens are open in front and the bunkers are shallow. Native grass roughs and groves of hardwoods add an idyllic touch.
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6. Pete Dye River Course of Virginia Tech
Public
6. Pete Dye River Course of Virginia Tech
Radford, VA, United States
4
49 Panelists
A donation from the Goodwin family in 2003 allowed the financial support to cover a complete redesign by Pete Dye on an existing 18-hole layout along the New River in Radford, Va. The River course earned a fourth-place award from Golf Digest in its Best Remodel rankings of 2006, the highest of any public facility. The course—which is the home to both Virginia Tech and Radford University’s golf teams—has earned the reputation as one of the best collegiate courses in the country.
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7. Stanford Golf Course
Private
7. Stanford Golf Course
Stanford, CA, United States
4.2
47 Panelists
Home to the top-ranked Cardinal men’s and women’s golf teams, the Stanford Course is a par-70 George C. Thomas and Billy Bell Jr. design that dates to the early 1930s. Tiger Woods, Tom Watson, Michelle Wie, and many more famed Stanford alums developed their games at this sprawling layout that was ranked on our America's 100 Greatest list in the 1970s. Grand oak trees line the fairways and elevated tee boxes provide beautiful views of the surrounding mountain scenery, especially on the 18th tee, where you can see San Francisco in the distance. There is strong layout variety at Stanford, with holes moving in each direction and a mix of wide-open tee shots and others that are quite narrow. Though it's a pleasant walk with few houses on the course, it can be strenous given the elevation changes and distance between some holes.
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8. Palouse Ridge Golf Club At Washington State University
3.8
25 Panelists
One of the most invigorating architectural feats by the late architect John Harbottle III—who died suddenly in 2012 but left an impressive portfolio with 15 original designs and 45 remodels mostly in the Pacific Northwest and California—is Palouse Ridge, home of the Washington State golf teams. Built on the site of an existing nine-hole course, Harbottle reimagined the layout with some acquired land as part of a $12 million project that opened in 2008. The course offers tee-time packages on Cougar football weekends.
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9. University Ridge Golf Course
Public
9. University Ridge Golf Course
Verona, WI, United States
4.1
44 Panelists
University Ridge is the home course of the University of Wisconsin men’s and women’s golf teams, as well as the annual host of the PGA Tour Champions’ American Family Insurance Championship. The front nine at this Robert Trent Jones Jr. design plays through a prairie and marshland before transitioning to wooded holes on the back. The last couple of holes open again to the prairie, including at the par-4 18th, which plays sharply uphill to the highest point on the property.
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10. The Course At Sewanee
Public
10. The Course At Sewanee
Sewanee, TN
It doesn't quite get the buzz as another nine-holer just 30 minutes away, but golf's hottest architect, Gil Hanse, did an extensive redesign of this nine-hole track in 2013. Though Hanse kept Sewanee’s original routing, he redesigned all nine greens, added new bunkers and created a new set of tees. The impressively rugged-yet-refined bunkering, prominent undulations and stunning vistas—most notably on the third and fifth holes—all give this layout character.
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11. Warren Golf Course at Notre Dame
Public
11. Warren Golf Course at Notre Dame
Notre Dame, IN, United States
4.2
50 Panelists
Given there is very little elevation change on Notre Dame’s Warren Golf Course, it was an impressive feat by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw to create a captivating design that compensates for the bland terrain with subtle doglegs moving in each direction, with strategically placed bunkers and trees creating high shot values. As is typical of Coore and Crenshaw designs, the course blends into the natural terrain and creates ample challenge not with bold, artificial features but thoughtful hazards and hole shapes. The course sits on 250 wooded acres just north of campus and is an Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary. Home to the university’s men’s and women’s golf teams, the course has hosted numerous NCAA regionals as well as the 2019 U.S. Senior Open. Steve Stricker won his first USGA championship, winning by six shots over David Toms.
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12. Birdwood Golf Course at Boar's Head Resort
Public
12. Birdwood Golf Course at Boar's Head Resort
Charlottesville, VA, United States
4.2
57 Panelists
Birdwood is a unique course that typifies the multi-purpose direction that future golf developments would be wise to study. Located about 10 minutes from downtown Charlottesville, it’s a convenient, upscale public course (green fees: $75-$125) that serves as an amenity to an adjacent resort, with a walkable routing across interesting and varied land. It’s also the home course for the University of Virginia golf teams boating state-of-the-art practice facilities, including a new par-3 course called “The Nest.” Originally opened in 1984, Davis Love III, along with brother Mark and lead designer Scot Sherman, re-routed and re-engineered the entire course, forging new holes out of previously unused forest. Rolling across the attractive northern Virginia countryside with long fescue grass buffers, the holes are infused with references to Pete Dye and classical-era template presentations. The Charlottesville, Va., layout hosted the 1991 U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links.
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13. Jimmie Austin Golf Club At The University of Oklahoma
Public
13. Jimmie Austin Golf Club At The University of Oklahoma
Norman, OK, United States
4.2
48 Panelists
Originally designed by Perry Maxwell and opened a year before is death in 1952, this home to the University of Oklahoma golf team has received several modern-day touch ups, the latest in 2017 by architect Tripp Davis, an OU grad and member of the 1989 National Championship golf team. Davis relocated tee boxes, shifted three fairways significantly, relocated five greens, lengthened the courses and redesigned all bunkers. He also added a four-hole Short Course.
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14. Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex: Kampen Course
Public
14. Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex: Kampen Course
West Lafayette, IN, United States
4
54 Panelists
It's fitting that one of the country's best college courses should be built by college students. Purdue students didn't design the Kampen Course at Purdue University, but they served as essential cost-saving labor for Pete Dye when he redesigned the course in the mid-1990s. When Dye and the kids (who had no previous construction experience) were done with it, the university's old North Course full of rudimentary holes running back and forth became a playground of the architect's postmodern trademarks including expansive waste bunkers studded witih grassy moguls, deep pot and trench bunkers, elevated greens angled against hazards, par 3s across water and even a drivable par 4 with mirrored right and left fairways arcing around a large central wasteland. Built on a shoestring, this project had a special meaning for Dye as Purdue was where he first began studying agronomy prior to switching from a successful career selling insurance to golf course design.
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15. U.S. Naval Academy Golf Club
Private
15. U.S. Naval Academy Golf Club
Annapolis, MD, United States
3.7
32 Panelists
Located across Seven River from the Naval Academy in Annapolis, the U.S. Naval Academy course received a significant boost in variety and complexity following a 2019 renovation from Andrew Green. The course has a rich heritage, designed by William Flynn in the 1920s, but the holes had become worn down and simplified, with lackluster bunkers and small, tilted greens. Green rebunkered the course as Flynn might have, adding over 20 of them in enlarged, more shapely forms. He also removed unnecessary trees and expanded fairways and greens to capture more playing angles and hole locations. A major improvement.
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16. Colbert Hills
Public
16. Colbert Hills
Manhattan, KS, United States
4
26 Panelists
Designed by eight-time PGA Tour winner Jim Colbert along with architect Jeff Brauer, Colbert Hills is the highest-ranked public course in state and ranked in the top 10 in our Best in Kansas rankings. Colbert, a decorated collegiate golfer who finished runner-up at NCAAs during his time at Kansas State, included a fun element as an homage to his alma mater on the fifth hole, with a bunker complex in the shape of a wildcat paw print (in honor of the school’s mascot). On big football weekends, the facility will make the sand purple. Colbert Hills is a challenging yet playable layout with strategic hazards but generous fairways and large putting surfaces, which average over 7,000 square feet. The rolling terrain offers terrific views of the beautiful Flint Hills region framed by native prairie tallgrass. In addition to being home of the Kansas State men’s and women’s golf teams, it also houses the First Tee of Manhattan, including the Earl Woods National Youth Golf Academy, named for Tiger’s father who was born in Manhattan, played baseball at K-State and was the first Black baseball player in the Big Seven conference (now the Big 12).
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17. Duke University Golf Club
Public
17. Duke University Golf Club
Durham, NC, United States
3.8
52 Panelists
Home to the Duke Blue Devils, a top NCAA Division I program, the Duke Golf Club features significant elevation changes and forced carries over narrow winding creeks. The track also has a fascinating history—it was designed by Robert Trent Jones Sr. in 1957, and it was soon honored as the host of the 1962 men’s NCAA Championship. Rees Jones, eldest son of the esteemed designer, played for Yale University in the championship that year. He went on to renovate the course himself in 1994.
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18. Orchards Golf Club
Private
18. Orchards Golf Club
South Hadley, MA, United States
3.8
21 Panelists
For students, college courses should be places of peace and respite. Few are better at diffusing the stresses of tests and campus life than The Orchards at Mount Holyoke in central Massachusetts. The course roams 160 acres of a beautifully secluded site with holes falling across natural grades lined with pines and fescue meadows. Donald Ross designed the first nine in 1922 and added the second in 1927 using little more than the sloping ground, a minimum of bunkering and a creek that crosses several fairways and fronts the 10th and 16th greens, the latter a short par 5 that begs players to try for the green with their second shots. The historically spartan maintenance budget has ensured the course's architecture hasn't strayed far from the original design, and restorative projects over the years, including a renovation by Ron Prichard, have primarily concentrated on expanding mowing lines, cleaning up bunkers and refurbishing the turf. Ross designed hundreds of courses in his career, sometimes drafting plans off topographical maps for properties he never personally visited. The Orchards wasn't one of them: Ross had good reason to visit the course repeatedly in the years after its completion because his daughter Lillian was a student at Mount Holyoke, graduating in 1932.
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19. The Rawls Course at Texas Tech
Public
19. The Rawls Course at Texas Tech
Lubbock, TX, United States
4
14 Panelists
This was Tom Doak's first project after completing Pacfiic Dunes at Bandon Dunes Resort. The Red Raider course was created from a flat, rectangular cotton field, but Doak's team transformed the land by moving 1.3 million yards of topsoil to create a stunning setting with incredible movement and natural-looking features. The result is a surprising amount of elevation changes for West Texas with wide fairways, factoring in the often-present wind, but deep bunkers and complicated green complexes, providing a challenge to better players while being playable for all levels.
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20. Radrick Farms Golf Course
Private
20. Radrick Farms Golf Course
Ann Arbor, MI, United States
3.8
35 Panelists
The Alister MacKenzie-designed course at the University of Michigan is ranked in the top five of Golf Digest’s top collegiate courses in America, and the university also owns Radrick Farms, a Pete and Alice Dye design, also a member of our Greatest College Courses list. Radrick Farms is Dye in his gentlest form. The course is one of Dye’s earliest designs and lacks many of the penal features that he used in his most famous layouts. Some bunkers have the steep faces Dye would use more in his later designs but many are quite forgiving. The course is built on a former gravel mine, giving the terrain significant elevation change of up to 100 feet across the property. Like the university’s MacKenzie design, Radrick Farms is semi-private and open to those with an affiliation to the university.
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21. University of Louisville Golf Club
Private
21. University of Louisville Golf Club
Simpsonville, KY, United States
3.5
44 Panelists
Formerly known as The Cardinal Club, the University of Louisville Golf Club is an appealing, walkable layout in a pastoral setting sprawled along gentle mounds despite its location adjacent to a major interstate. Ponds, small lakes, and streams are used to create natural hazards and do not appear contrived or out of place. While most of the course is open, several holes are routed through woody areas and provide moments of solitary escape and tranquility before spilling out onto open land once again. Landing areas are fairly wide but thick rough, copious water, dense native grass areas and strategically placed overhanging trees will punish errant tee shots.
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22. Seminole Legacy Golf Club
Private
22. Seminole Legacy Golf Club
Tallahassee, FL, United States
4.5
18 Panelists
Seminole Legacy, the home course for the Florida State golf teams, can stretch to 7,800 yards but begs the question: Is that even long enough? It's far more apt for today's collegiate players than the former 7,100-yard layout from 1962. The course underwent a full-bore $10 million remodel in 2019 by Nicklaus Design with Jack Nicklaus II leading the project. The new design somehow managed to reconfigure nearly every hole—switching directions, creating new green sites—while staying respectful of the original hole corridors and particularly the mature pines and live oaks that outline avenues across the property. Florida has a repuatation as a flat state, but that's not true in the northwest panhandle around Tallahassee and westward as evidenced by sites like this one with lovely rise and fall. That means Seminole Legacy retains a sense of established gentility infused with contemporary bunkering and slick, smooth-shouldered greens that do more than enough to challenge the game's best amateurs.
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23. The Meadows at Grand Valley State University
Dr. Michael Hurdzan, who co-designed Erin Hills and Calusa Pines, laid out The Meadows at Grand Valley State University in 1994. Hurdzan’s Ph.D. is in Environmental Plant Physiology, and his attention to the environment is present at The Meadows, as many holes are flanked by native grasses that help the course blend with the natural terrain. Situated just west of Grand Rapids, Mich., The Meadows has hosted numerous NCAA Division II National Championships for both men and women. There are very few doglegs on the course, allowing players to hit a variety of shots, though forced carries over natural areas, including at the par-4 18th, require players to make solid contact. With summer rates under $50, The Meadows offers tremendous value for a course that Golf Digest ranks as one of the top college courses in the country.
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24. Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex: Ackerman-Allen
Public
24. Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex: Ackerman-Allen
West Lafayette, IN, United States
3.8
54 Panelists
The Ackerman-Allen course at Purdue’s 36-hole Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex was originally designed by Bill Diddel and opened in 1934. The Purdue South Course, as it was known back then, hosted the 1955 U.S. Junior Amateur and the 1961 NCAA Men’s Golf Championship, the latter of which was won by Purdue, with Jack Nicklaus claiming the individual title. Pete Dye, who designed the sibling Kampen course, redesigned the Ackerman-Allen layout in 2015-’16.
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25. Seven Oaks Golf Club
Public
25. Seven Oaks Golf Club
Hamilton, NY
Seven Oaks Golf Club, located in Hamilton, N.Y., is home to the Colgate men’s golf team and is situated on the northern end of campus. In the early 1930s, Robert Trent Jones Sr. visited campus to begin designing one of his first courses. However, the Great Depression and World War II put the project on hold for over 20 years. It was not until 1956 when work began on the first nine holes, which opened in 1958. Today, the course is a parkland design with several water hazards and large, gently undulating greens.
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