Following a 34th NCAA tournament appearance last season, Tech begins the 2025–26 golf season with strong hopes to contend at ACCs and make a run at an NCAA Championship.
Returning seven out of the eight players from the 2024 roster (with former Jacket Carson Kim transferring to Pepperdine), the Jackets’ season will depend on the development of their returning core. Tech is ranked 13th nationally according to the Bushnell/Golfweek Coaches Poll, making them one of four ACC teams inside the top 25.Redshirt senior Benjamin Reuter begins the year ranked 22nd on the initial PGA Tour university rankings.
With a strong returning group, Tech’s lineup will likely look extremely similar to 2024. The likely top four will be 2024 National Champion Hiroshi Tai, Swedish sophomore Albert Hansson, long-hitting Kale Fontenot and Reuter. All four of these returners rank inside the World Amateur Golf Rankings (WAGR) top 200. The fifth spot in the lineup is where the questions lie for the Jackets this season.
Head Coach Bruce Heppler has four options to fill this spot: he could choose a team veteran, either redshirt junior Brady Rackley IV or senior Aidan Tran, or he could try out a younger option in sophomore Didrik Ringvall Bengtsson or incoming freshman Rawson Hardy. Expect Heppler to try every option throughout the fall season to pinpoint the right fit.
Tech’s sole new addition, Hardy, joins a group of seven that finished just outside the top 15 at NCAAs last year. Hardy, a Utah native, reclassified to 2025 from 2026, where he was ranked number 52 overall according to Junior Golf Scoreboard. Hardy boasts an impressive tournament record, including an individual and team state championship win in 4A and five top 20 American Junior Golf Association (AJGA) finishes in 2024. Heppler, a Utah native himself, continues to utilize the recruiting pipeline that brought him two-time All ACC selection Connor Howe.
Tech begins their season this week at the Visit Knoxville Collegiate, one of four tournaments that Heppler’s Jackets plan to participate in this fall. Last season, Tech finished in eighth place with both Tai and Hansson placing inside the top 20.
Following a trip to Knoxville, Tech will travel twice more, to Illinois for the Fighting Illini Invitational at Olympia Fields and Fort Worth, Texas for the Ben Hogan Collegiate Invitational, before hosting the Golf Club of Georgia Collegiate Invitational. Both the Fighting Illini and the Ben Hogan invitational are hosted at world class courses that either have hosted or currently host PGA Tour events.
After the fall season, all eyes will turn to spring, where Tech will chase their ever-elusive first team national title. While yet to announce their official schedule, Tech has their eyes on three tournaments at the end of the season —ACCs, NCAA Regionals and the NCAA Championship.
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