When golfer Anthony Bradley visited Austin Peay in Winter 2009 there was nothing he didn't like.
"I had five schools interested in me and I chose Austin Peay," said Bradley, a native of Plymouth, England. "It just seemed like the right fit for me because of the school size—it was the right size—and the class sizes were smaller, something I really liked. But also there were four other freshmen and I decided it (going through the college experience) was something we all could do together.
"What most don't realize is growing up (in England), you either go pro when you turn 18 or go to the University (for education)…you don't really have much of a choice. Thanks to ProDreamUSA, (an agency that helps foreign golfers) — my dad signed me up — they helped me decide to come to the states. The United States is only country I am aware of that offers both education and sports at a high level."
One of those five freshmen was Marco Iten, who entered the Austin Peay Athletics Hall of Fame a year ago and someone who Anthony regularly converses with but it also serves as testimony how good the Governors were in the second decade of the 2000s (Bradley becomes the fourth former Golf Gov who played for Kayden to enter the APSU Athletics Hall of Fame). Team-wise the Governors finished fifth in the OVC tourney in 2011 but that helped propel the Govs to a pair of runner-up finishes sandwiched around a dominating 2013 OVC championship.
"I was very fortunate to have three Power 5 golfers in Anthony, Marco and Dustin (Korte, who was one year older than Bradley and Iten)," said former coach Kirk Kayden. "It was a pretty special era, that's for sure. I believe the golf team went something like two years and never finished out of the Top 5 in every (regular-season) tournament—that is how good they were.
"They were just so competitive. At practice, in qualifiers, in tournaments…they just kept pushing each other."
"He is right," Bradley said. "We were not trying to get better per se. We were trying to beat each other, whether it was in the weight room or on the practice range or in tournaments and we had just an incredible run. I think we just pushed each other and I think you see that at all levels with good teams in every sport. They just pushed each other to get better."
Bradley led the Governors in both 2011-12 and 2012-13. In fact, after being second-team All-Ohio Valley Conference in 2011-12 he repeated that honor the next season but also added an OVC all-tournament honor as well as OVC medalist, winning the league tourney by three strokes, shooting an-opening round 66 (his Austin Peay low).
"I have never seen a sadder scene for someone winning a championship," said Kayden. "We were leading by one stroke on the final hole and Anthony hit it out-of-bounds. He still was able to win the OVC tourney because he had such a big lead (five shots) going into the final hole. He won medalist honors but was so wishing his teammates could go with him."
"Honestly, some 10 years later, I think about that day," Bradley said. "The tee shot always will be in my mind for a bad reason. I had something like a four- or five-shot lead going into that final hole and had a bad golf swing—I hit the tee shot out of bounds at Greystone and as a team we lost by one shot.
"I was able to go to the regional (Olde Stone Golf Cub in Bowling Green, Ky.) but don't think I played particularly well because I went as an individual and not with my team—I always thought my teammates should have been playing. It would have been different (participating in the regional) had we lost by six shots but we lost by one and believed it was my fault they were not at the regional."
As both recalled, rising senior Dustin Korte got into the van after that one-shot loss (to Jacksonville State) and said "if this doesn't motivate you, nothing will."
"We were on the course the very next day," Bradley said. "That day forward, we were in weight room, on the practice range, on the golf course every day because we didn't want a repeat of what happened."
No it didn't happen. In fact, not only were the Govs dominant during the regular season, winning four times, they ran away with the OVC title, capturing the rain-shortened tournament by nine shots, shooting back-to-back four-under 284s. Bradley was named first-team All-OVC for a first time and earned his second all-tourney team.
They then flew to Tempe, Arizona, to compete in the NCAA Region and, although the Govs didn't advance to the NCAA championship tourney (the top 5 teams advanced), they finished an OVC-best tie for seventh with Duke, but ahead of Vanderbilt for a second time that season while defeating Atlantic Coast Conference powers Clemson and North Carolina.
That set up a senior season that saw Iten, winning a stunning four times, emerge as the Governors leader on the course as Bradley, who got married during the offseason, relinquished that moniker to him but Bradley certainly was still good enough to earn his second straight first-team All-OVC selection (becoming the only golfer in Austin Peay's storied golf history to earn All-OVC honor all four seasons) as well as All-OVC tourney. He also was named the Men's Legends Award recipient as APSU's top senior male athlete.
Now the father of two is golf pro at Valley Links Golf Course at French Lick Resort and is considered one of the game's top young teachers, Bradley has some 25-30 college golfers and one pro (Adam Shank, who finished 81st on the PGA money list a year ago) under his tutelage.
"I am not surprised he is working with young golfers," Kayden said. "When he was here he always was good helping the other golfers and has really great ability to relate to them. He literally is following in his uncle's (Nick Bradley) footsteps. His uncle is one of the top high-level teachers in the game and moved to the states a few years ago to work on the PGA tour."
Bradley also is on the 100-member National Fitters Board--one of 10 golf pros on the committee—which allows him to test and offer feedback about equipment and new products for the Callaway brand, which totaled net sales of more than $3 billion in 2021.
It also allows him to participate in Calloway-sponsored events. Bradley won the Midwest Regional Callaway Staff Championship in October. Bradley proved he still has a winning touch by firing a 67 and then birdying a playoff hole to win Callaway's regional qualifying event in October at White Eagle Golf Club in Naperville, Illinois. He was one of 45 competitors who played and finished second in the Callaway Staff Championship, a first-time event, Dec. 14-15. Callaway created the event for its staff professionals and brand representatives played at Torrey Pines, the San Diego course that has hosted the U.S. Open twice and is home to the PGA Tour's annual Farmers Insurance Open.
And while he is appreciates the ability to still compete, the longer he is away from Austin Peay also has allowed Bradley to appreciate more his former coach.
"I can't say enough good things about Coach Kayden," Bradley said. "Our mentality derived from his. Whether it was being at the range until it decided to get dark or us working out the next morning, he was always there. Every single workout and every single practice he was there. I probably thought back then 'you should be at those workouts because it is your job.' But now I realize how hard he worked. Like I said, our mentality came from him."
