When a younger Austin Perkins first took out his club and addressed the ball, he often heard that familiar declaration: “Hey, you’re hitting the ball from the wrong side.”
The naysayer was mistaken. For Perkins, left was right.
He said when he first started playing in a typical event of 90 players, there might be two lefties. “So, they could see and only knew I was a lefty, but probably didn’t know my name,” he said. “But I’ve always believed if you play well, they’ll know your name.’’
The Connecticut golf world now knows Perkins’ name, game and fame.
In June, the 16-year-old Perkins became the youngest Connecticut Amateur winner in its 122-year history with a 3-and-1 victory over Jack Chung in the scheduled 36-hole finale pitting the championship’s two youngest finalists. Perkins led by as many as six holes in the match before holding off a charging Chung.
Perkins said the venue, Torrington Country Club in Goshen, Connecticut, set up perfectly for him. “It was about course management and hitting the right club from specific spots,” he said. “I didn’t hit a lot of drivers. My wedges inside 85 yards were really good.”
Such prowess was in contrast to the first day of stroke-play qualifying when Perkins carded a 5–over-par 77. He rebounded with a 70 to make the 32-player match-play field.
The field received a demonstrative forecast of Perkins’ pedigree in his first match when the No. 28 seed notched a 1-up victory over defending champion Rick Dowling, who was seeking his fourth Connecticut Amateur title.
The toughest match before the finale for Perkins, a member of Hartford Golf Club, was a victory over two-time champion Zach Zaback on the 21st hole. Perkins made a demanding 12-foot slider to save par on the par-5 second hole (the second extra hole of the match) and extend the match.
“Great putt. I was rolling the rock well that week,” said Perkins, ranked No. 1 in Connecticut by the American Junior Golf Association.
His Connecticut Amateur victory broke the age record set by Tommy McDonagh, who was 17 when he triumphed in 2006, and made Perkins the youngest champion in the championship’s long history.
“I’ve put a lot of hard work into my game, and a lot of it’s gone unnoticed,” Perkins said after the win. “I started playing a little later than most kids, but I really knew that with hard work and dedication that I could catch up fast.”
As a bonus, for the first time the Connecticut Amateur title also qualified the winner for the U.S. Amateur, to be played August 12-18 at Hazeltine National in Minnesota.
“It’s a huge thrill because it’ll be my first USGA event,” Perkins said.
The achievements are more laudatory considering, by his own admission, Perkins “didn’t fully commit to golf” until he was 12 years old. A primary reason for that was COVID, which shut down or severely impacted playing opportunities in other sports.
But many golf courses in Connecticut remained open. Perkins was a frequent visitor to Hartford GC, where he’d play or be on the range. This was familiar turf because this was where his father, Austin, had introduced and taught him the game.
A few months later Perkins participated in a U.S. Kids Golf Foundation tournament at Timberlin Golf Club in Berlin, Connecticut. “Most of the players had caddies,” he said. “I always liked carrying my own bag, so I did. I shot an 81. I wanted to break 80.”
Golf became the No. 1 sport for Perkins, who had earlier played many sports and excelled most in hockey – which he started playing at age 3 – and baseball. He was a member of the Simsbury Youth Hockey Bantam A (U14) team, which won the Connecticut Hockey Conference Tier II state championship when he was 13.
“I played competitive hockey for 12 or 13 years, 5-6 with the Connecticut Junior Huskies,” he said. “I was a left winger.”
When the weather turned warmer, he pitched and played first base in the West Hartford Little League and Youth Baseball Leagues and with the Connecticut Mustangs AAU team.
“I liked the camaraderie of being on a team with friends – practicing, competing – and, of course, when we won,” Perkins said. “But I found it much harder to pitch in the bottom of the seventh inning and having to strike somebody out or to get an out, than to make a 5-foot putt. Golf is static. You control the ball.”
He said that reality does not occur once the puck is dropped or a pitch is thrown: “In baseball, once the ball leaves your hand all chaos can happen. It’s a team sport, instead of a me sport.”
Perkins, a student at Kingswood Oxford School in West Hartford, stored away his competitive baseball glove and skates to focus on golf.
Possessing natural athletic ability and impressive hand-eye coordination, he recalled seeing the same traits when members of the American Hockey League’s Hartford Wolf Pack played at Gillette Ridge Golf Club in Bloomfield. “You could just see it with the way they hit the ball,” Perkins said. “They had it.”
Perkins always loved skating, doing the drills and practicing. He just changed the venue.
“I was a rink rat,” he said. “Now I’m a range rat.”
A four- to five-hour session on the range is common for him. “My body is flexible. I don’t get sore hitting a lot of shots,” said Perkins, who tees it up in this week’s Connecticut Open, which starts today at Shorehaven Golf Club in Norwalk..
Perkins believes the strengths of his game are hitting his irons and his ball-striking.
“I don’t worry about missing a green from 150 yards in,” said Perkins, who works with two coaches – Jim Becker, head golf professional at Blue Fox Run Golf Course in Avon; and Tom Rosati, director of golf instruction at his academy at Great River Golf Club in Milford.
As he’ll start his junior year of high school this fall, Perkins is still searching for where to play in college.
“The college process is pretty grueling; there are hundreds of talented high school players out there,” he said.
The star of his graduating class is Miles Russell, 15, of Jacksonville Beach, Florida, the world’s No. 1-ranked junior. Among Russell’s achievements are being the youngest player to make a cut in Korn Ferry Tour history and to post a top-25 finish (tied for 20th in the Lecom Suncoast Classic) in either a KFT or PGA Tour event. In June, Russell shot even-par 144 but missed the cut in the Rocket Mortgage Classic on the PGA Tour.
“I haven’t played with Miles,” Perkins said. “My buddies down south play with him a lot. Miles is miles above any other junior. Every junior golfer knows it.”
That is one lefty complimenting another lefty whom he hopes to one day challenge.
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Top: Left-handed 16-year-old Austin Perkins makes history at 122nd Connecticut Amateur
COURTESY CONNECTICUT STATE GOLF ASSOCIATION