ITHACA, N.Y. – The arduous road to the PGA Tour is one that's never been fully traversed by a Cornell golfer. For all intents and purposes, Luke Graboyes '17 became the first to see the summit last month – but then the COVID-19 pandemic intervened, leading to uncertainty as to if and when Graboyes will get that opportunity.
 
The third-year professional now living in South Florida with his younger brother, Mike Graboyes '18, is taking it in stride. The elder Graboyes – the medalist of the 2016 Ivy League Championship – earned a spot in the field for PGA Tour's Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship by advancing through an open qualifier held on March 9 at The Preserve at Ironhorse in West Palm Beach, Florida. Only he still hasn't had the chance to cash in that ticket. The PGA Tour's lone event in the Dominican Republic was scheduled for March 26-29, but it was been postponed due to health concerns.
 
Of course, the PGA Tour's scheduling quagmire is far from unique in the sports world right now. Like seemingly all of the major leagues based in North America, the tour is starting to lay the foundation for best-case scenarios in returning to action. Earlier this week, the PGA Tour went so far to announce new dates for three of its major championships and the FedEx Cup playoffs in late summer through the fall.
 
But there's one peculiar development in all of the shuffling. Of the tour's nine tournaments from March 12 to May 7, eight have been formally canceled and just one is still listed as merely postponed – the event at Puntacana. That leaves a glimmer of hope that the tournament might be rescheduled, and Graboyes can make that coveted PGA Tour debut. 

'Break of a lifetime'

To earn that feat, Graboyes competed March 9 in an event in West Palm Beach that's commonly referred to as a Monday qualifier. They're commonly held in advance of the PGA Tour's events to round out the field for the given tournament. In this particular case, four spots were up for grabs in a field of 66. It's a bit of a calculated risk, because the entry fee runs in the neighborhood of $450 and there's no payout for any placement – just the slim chance of making the field of a PGA Tour event. Even then, there's no guaranteed pay check. Only roughly half of a PGA Tour tournament field earns prize money at an event after a 36-hole cut.
 
Still, Monday qualifiers have won PGA Tour tournaments before. So while it typically takes a round in the mid-60s to advance through a Monday qualifier, the margin for error is awfully slim. With all of that in mind, it would have been understandable for Graboyes to pack it in after making the turn at 1-over 37 at The Preserve.
 
"But I played a really solid front nine," Graboyes said. "Everyone can see the score card (online), but you can't see I missed an 8-foot putt, then an easy up-and-down, and another 8-footer on three holes in a row. I was kind of bummed I had a couple opportunities, but it was nuts that day."
 
Specifically, he was referring to the playing conditions. With the wind blowing at 25-30 mph, Graboyes correctly deduced that scores would be higher than normal. For example, he hit a 5-iron on one of the par 3s on the back nine that played directly into the wind. In still conditions, he said that's a club that carries about 200 yards. On this day, it didn't even make it 150 yards. So Graboyes knew he had work to do, but he also knew it was possible.
 
By hitting an approach with a wedge to 5 feet on the 10th hole, Graboyes got back to even par with his first birdie of the day. Another birdie on the short par-5 14th brought him into red numbers, but the momentum looked to be in danger on the 15th. He misjudged the wind with his approach to the par 4 and watched the ball launch 40 yards over the pin.
 
"I had to use a laser (to determine distance) for my third shot after hitting a 7-iron – which is really not a good thing," he quipped.
 
But by knocking that pitch to 10 feet and nailing the par putt, Graboyes kept positive momentum. Then, some good fortunate helped. His 91-yard approach on the par-4 16th from the rough took one hop on the green and landed in the hole for an eagle 2. Just like that, Graboyes went from hopeful at 1-under with three to play to sitting pretty at 3-under with two to play.
 
"That was a break of a lifetime right there," Graboyes said.
 
After holing a 12-foot birdie putt on the 17th, Graboyes admittedly made a mess of the par-5 18th as the nerves started to kick in. His drive flirted with out-of-bounds stakes on the left. After laying up, he hit the green with his third. "It was the most nervous two-putt of my life," he added.
 
Safely in with a 4-under-par 68, Graboyes waited as the majority of the field trickled in after him. Not only was he safe to qualify, he ended up being the event's medalist.

There's Still A Chance

All Graboyes can do now is wait to see if the Puntacana is rescheduled for later this year. There are reasons to believe that it could be. For starters, it's a tournament that runs opposite a World Golf Championship event (which would lure the top 64 players in the world), so that naturally leads to a slightly scaled-down production and fewer logistics, Graboyes explained.
 
Second, a theoretically more compact schedule in the late summer and fall would lead to more of the world's top players competing more frequently. With deeper fields, there would be more opportunity to hold a quality event opposite a PGA Tour event with an elite field (i.e., the BMW Championship – now scheduled for Aug. 27-30 – has a field capped at 70).
 
Finally, there are now two mid-summer holes in the PGA Tour schedule created by the cancelation of The British Open (July 16-19) and the postponement of The Olympic Games (July 30-Aug. 2). Both of those weekends now have "Potential PGA Tour Tournament" listed on the tour's official schedule web page. It's unclear what those options are, other than the Puntacana.
 
Regardless, the odds still don't look terribly good for Graboyes' Monday qualifier to bear any fruit. If the event is ultimately canceled, he said the extent of his recourse is probably "writing a very nice letter to the tournament director" to seek a special exemption into the 2021 field.
 
Even if this opportunity ultimately flitters away, it was far from a likely career breakthrough. The only guarantee for PGA Tour status from a single event like the Puntacana is for those that finish in the top 10 – the winner gets a two-year exemption on tour, and second through 10th places get a spot in the tour's next tournament. Other than that, it would just be great experience and probably the best golf-related paycheck Graboyes has seen yet. But when you're trying to establish yourself as a professional golfer, money equals time. As the golfing world awaits the green light to get back to tournament play, Graboyes will keep preparing for mini-tour events and Monday qualifiers by day and doing some part-time tutoring at night.
 
"It's unfortunate (if the Puntacana doesn't happen), but I haven't been too bummed about it," Graboyes said, likening the experience to a high school basketball player being invited to play in a pick-up game against Kobe Bryant. "That week was going to be awesome, but the reality for me is that I'm probably going back to first stage of (the PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament in the fall)."