When Justin Hastings was in middle school, he told his parents he was sick on the Thursday of the Masters golf tournament, stayed home from school and watched the first round on television.
The next year, sick again on the second Thursday in April.
“It took them about two years to catch on,” Hastings said, “before they started to be like, this is getting a little bit of a coincidence. … I’d push pretty hard, and eventually that just became a thing in my household, that the Thursday of the Masters, Justin was going to be staying home to watch the coverage.”
The San Diego State senior was telling the story this week … from Augusta National Golf Club.
“I don’t know that it’s totally hit me,” he said, “that I’m playing in the Masters.”
Hastings won the Latin America Amateur Championship in January in Argentina, which comes with invitations to the Masters, U.S. Open and Open Championship in Great Britain. So Hastings flew to Augusta, Ga., this week, has a caddie in a white jumpsuit and green hat, is staying at the iconic Crow’s Nest dormitory in the clubhouse attic with the other amateurs, is walking the same grounds as childhood idol Phil Mickelson.
Hastings was just 6 and hadn’t taken up golf when Mickelson launched his famed 6-iron from the pine straw on the 13th hole en route to the 2010 Masters title. But he’s seen it on video too many times to count – the ball slipping through a narrow gap between two trees, just clearing Rae’s Creek, landing on the raised green and stopping 4 feet from the hole.
Hastings went to Augusta National last month to play some practice rounds. Plopped down a ball in the pine straw at 13 from 206 yards out and tried to thread it through the trees.
“Really just to let everything sink in and see the property,” Hastings said of the scouting trip, “and hit the occasional cool shot in history that I’ve seen and grew up watching. I was always a big Masters nut as a kid.”
Amateur Justin Hastings, a senior at SDSU, looks on from the 15th hole during a practice round prior to the 2025 Masters in Augusta, Ga. (Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images)
The crazy part of Hastings’ story is that he was dreaming about the pine straw on 13 from the Cayman Islands, a British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean just south of Cuba that has 66,653 residents and, as Hastings puts it, “one and a half golf courses” — an 18-hole public links and a nine-hole private course at the Ritz-Carlton resort.
Hastings grew up at the North Sound Golf Club and its “aqua” driving range where you hit floating balls into a lagoon. He first went with his father, whom he describes as a “casual golfer,” and soon was being dropped off at the course every day after school.
“I just flew with it from there,” Hastings said. “It wasn’t ever practice to me, it was just fun. … The lack of resources just never had too big of a detrimental effect on me.”
By 14, he was playing in the Latin America Amateur Championship, which serves golfers from South America, Central America, Mexico and the Caribbean. And, incredible as it may seem, he’s not the first Caymanian to win the LAAC and qualify for the Masters; Aaron Jarvis did it in 2022.
SDSU golf coach Ryan Donovan has a history of uncovering recruiting gems and polishing them into championship college and professional golfers. Hastings is just the latest, joining Aztecs alums Xander Schauffele and J.J. Spaun in the 95-player Masters field.
Donovan first saw Hastings at a camp, then sent an assistant coach to Europe to watch him at an amateur event there.
He liked his length between tee and green. What he liked even more was between the ears.
“He’s just very mature and his mental game — he’s tough,” Donovan said. “He had work to do on his actual game, but he was trending in the right direction. Coming from the Cayman Islands with 27 holes, he wasn’t looking for everything that he didn’t really have. That’s kind of how we run our program, that we kind of have a chip on our shoulder.
“We have a great schedule, great weather and you get better every day. He just worked and got better every year. He was just OK as a freshman, not great. Now he’s our leader and everyone respects him.”
Justin Hastings, of the Cayman Islands, watches his tee shot on the third hole during the final round of the Mexico Open golf tournament in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, Sunday, Feb. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
That’s probably because he respects the college game, so much that he invited six current or former teammates to Augusta to walk with him during practice rounds. So much that after missing the cut at the Puerto Rico Open last month, he called Donovan and said he was flying back to play in the Lamkin Classic, the annual tournament SDSU hosts at the San Diego County Club. The tournament was three days away.
“I was like, ‘OK, I think you’re pretty tired, but sure,’” Donovan said.
Hastings won the individual title in the 54-hole event with a record score of 16-under par, and the Aztecs took the team title by 16 strokes.
Next on their schedule is the Western Intercollegiate at Pasatiempo Golf Club in Santa Cruz, starting Monday on a course, like Augusta National, designed by famed architect Alister MacKenzie. Hastings plans to be there, even if he makes the cut at the Masters and plays through the weekend.
His career scoring average at college events is currently 71.28, under Schauffele’s school record of 71.50.
Told that this week at Augusta, Schauffele playfully cracked: “I was not aware of that. … Thank you for that. That’s helping my confidence, my growth process.”
Seven amateurs qualified for this year’s Masters, but only five are playing. Two others opted to turn pro earlier this season and chase prize money, knowing it would invalidate their entries to golf’s hallowed ground as amateurs.
The kid who skipped school to watch the Masters was asked if he considered joining them.
“Yeah, I mean, I don’t want to speak on behalf of anybody else’s decisions, but personally this is just too amazing of an opportunity to pass on for me,” said Hastings, who is up to No. 24 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings. “It’s been a dream ever since I was a kid, and I don’t think there’s anything in this world that could stop me from being here if I was given the chance.”
He’s played practice rounds with Justin Rose, Patrick Reed and Tommy Fleetwood. On Tuesday, he plopped down his green bag of balls on the practice range; Rory McIlroy was stroking drivers next to him. He’s had access to Mickelson’s yardage book from Augusta National with tips on each hole.
“Just being in the presence of the best players in the world, the guys you grow up watching on TV and idolizing, I think that’s super cool,” Hastings said. “You turn a corner and you see the No. 1 player in the world in your face, it’s like, ‘Wow.’
“It’s totally surreal, and I don’t think I’ll be able to put it into words now. I don’t know if I ever will.”
Originally Published: April 9, 2025 at 2:01 PM PDT
