Center Grove graduate Erica Shepherd is wrapping up her final season of golf at Duke and plans to spend the rest of the year beginning her pursuit of a professional career.
Submitted photo | Duke Athletics
Sometimes, you just know it’s time for you to move on.
Erica Shepherd returned to Duke University after the holiday break with every intention of coming back again next fall to pursue a master’s degree and take advantage of a fifth year of collegiate golf eligibility. But when she got back on campus and classes resumed, the Center Grove graduate had a change of heart.
“When I got back to school this semester, I kind of felt like it was my last semester,” Shepherd said. “I just felt ready for the next step, so I felt that as a sign to start pursuing my dream of what I’ve always wanted to do and what I went to Duke for.”
That dream is a career in professional golf. Once the Blue Devils’ season ends next month — whether at the NCAA regionals May 8-10 or in the finals May 19-24 — and Shepherd collects her bachelor’s degree, she’ll turn her attention toward trying to earn a spot on the LPGA Tour for next year.
That process won’t be an easy one. The LPGA and Epson Tour Qualifying Tournament (often referred to as Q-School) is a rigorous three-stage event that narrows the field of tour hopefuls down to the very best of the best.
The first stage will be held in California Aug. 28-31, and the second in Florida from Oct. 17-20. The third and final stage, consisting of six competitive rounds, will be played at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail’s Magnolia Grove Golf Course in Mobile, Alabama, from Nov. 30 through Dec. 5. The top 20 players (plus ties) there will earn Category 14 status on the LPGA Tour for 2024; everyone else in the top 45 will get Category 15 LPGA status and a spot on the developmental Epson Tour.
Being able to compete on the biggest stages in golf is something that Shepherd has long proven capable of. She competed in two U.S. Opens and made the cut in three other LPGA events while still in high school, and she’s been invited to the Augusta National Women’s Amateur in all four years of the tournament’s existence, registering three top-25 finishes.
A two-time All-American at Duke, Shepherd is currently ranked among the top 100 amateur players in the world.
“She feels like she’s ready, and she is ready,” said Shepherd’s longtime coach Brent Nicoson, who leads the men’s and women’s teams at the University of Indianapolis. “There’s some stuff that she needs to do to fine-tune, and she knows that, and just getting a little more consistent and shooting some lower numbers. She’s made a couple of swing changes here in the last year or two to help prepare for that … (and) putting it in play at Duke was a little bit tougher than she thought, but in the long term it’s going to be a good move for her.
“There’s never a time that we would ever doubt Erica.”
Shepherd says she will likely spend her summer trying to qualify for various pro events to gain additional experience. During that time and through the Q-School process, she’ll split her time between Durham, North Carolina and her native Greenwood, where she’ll get to work more frequently with Nicoson again.
When winter nears, she’s planning to relocate to Florida, where she’ll work with renowned swing coach Tony Ruggiero.
“I know that I want to be based in Florida,” Shepherd said of her longer-term plans. “For pro golf, it’s kind of non-negotiable.”
Now that her academic career is nearing its end — final exams are next week — Shepherd will be able to focus all of her energy on the sport for the first time in a while.
“I think it’s going to be awesome, but at the same time it’s going to take a while to learn the right balance,” she said.
Fortunately for Shepherd, she isn’t navigating the path into the professional ranks blindly. Several of her former Duke teammates have already made that same jump, and she’s been able to lean on those players and the Blue Devil coaching staff for advice.
“That was a big reason I came to Duke, because I know that they have so much experience with helping players transition from amateur to pro and do it really well,” Shepherd said. “So I’m just surrounded by people at Duke who have that experience and are able to help, and they’ve made the biggest difference for sure. I’m not sure what I would have done without them.”
And for the time being, she’s still one of them. The Blue Devils, 25th nationally in the latest Golfweek rankings, will next compete in NCAA regional play at the PGA National Resort in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
Shepherd feels good about where the team sits heading in.
“We’re feeling good. We won a tournament a couple of events ago, and the team is really strong right now from 1 to 5,” she said. “We’ve struggled in the fall and the beginning of the spring, but it’s finally starting to come together for the team.”
Nicoson feels similarly confident that things will also come together for Shepherd as an individual over the back half of 2023 and beyond.
“Now that she can just focus on golf again and not have academics and studies to worry about, that’s when she plays her best golf,” he said. “So I think we’re going to see a big summer from her and as she moves into Q-School.”
