NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
Kai Trump made her LPGA debut Thursday at The Annika at Pelican Golf Club in Belleair, Florida, taking a tremendous step toward what’s been a lifelong goal for her.
But first, she will play college golf for the Miami Hurricanes, officially joining the next recruiting class earlier this week to compete next fall.
“It was a big day for our program, big day for our university, and Kai’s a big part of that. It’s a class we’ve been working on for a long time,” Miami women’s golf head coach Jim Garren said from The Annika in an interview with Fox News Digital.
The 18-year-old granddaughter of President Donald Trump will undoubtedly draw attention to the Hurricanes next year — her range session on Thursday morning was jam-packed with media and fans of both her grandfather and herself through her YouTube channel. But for Garren, recruiting Trump was strictly a golf decision.
“We recruited Kai as a golf prospect. We saw the potential in what she could do. All of this with us has been strictly golf,” Garren said. “And look, at the end of the day, we all knew when her popularity boomed, but if you take a look back at that and when that date occurred, that was a month after the initial time we could reach out to the class of 2026. So we’ve been following her for a long time, we knew about her golf potential, and we had done our due diligence well before she came into fame. So the prospect side of that has always been there for us. She knows we’re coming into this from the golf side.”
The extra eyeballs won’t hurt, either, as Garren said he feels a responsibility to grow the game and expand the Miami brand.
KAI TRUMP MAKES LPGA DEBUT: WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT PRESIDENT’S GRANDDAUGHTER’S BIG DAY ON THE GOLF COURSE
“I think anytime you can bring awareness, not only to the University of Miami, to our program, to our athletic department, that’s a good thing,” added Garren. “I was fortunate to see Caitlin Clark out here yesterday and what she’s brought not only to women’s basketball, but to women’s athletics as a whole. I was very fortunate to work at Oklahoma when Patty Gasso was kind of in the midst of starting this unbelievable run in softball. So not only do I think that attention brings a lot to our program, it helps us develop and helps us continue to recruit world-class players and do what we need to do as a program. I look at attention as a good thing for women’s athletics as a whole, and specifically collegiate women’s athletics.
“If we can bring someone into our program that’s going to help with that, absolutely we’re comfortable with that. Our job is to continue to grow the games. Yeah, we have to compete for championships, and that’s part of coaching. But as stewards of the game, we have to continue to grow it. And I think any kind of exposure we can have to Miami, not only for our program, but our brand in general, which, in my opinion, it’s one of the most recognizable brands and logos in the world, absolutely, we welcome the exposure.”
And by the time Trump is competing for titles at The U, Garren predicted that she would be ready for the moment.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
“I’m sitting out here at The Annika right now, seeing how many people are going to watch her play golf — you can’t emulate that in practice. You can’t emulate the pressure it takes to play in front of this many people at her age. She’s been on a worldwide stage for a year now,” Garren said.
“Pressure for her when it comes to golf, teeing it up in a Division I golf tournament, that’s gonna be easier for her. And you look at it right there, who can handle the pressure? Kai’s benefiting from every time she hits the golf ball, she’s under the spotlight. So for us, she’s going to get better and golf, and it’s our job to develop her as a player, but from the pressure, there’s nothing we can put in front of her that she hasn’t already seen.”
It was not a great start for Trump, as she sits at the bottom of the leaderboard entering Friday. But by far the youngest player in the field, she can now play with house money and stress-free.
Follow Fox News Digital’s sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
