I’ve played this course many times – and it just keeps getting better

At GOLF.com, the travel—and the game of golf—is part of the gig. Here, as we count down the final days of 2024, is a look at some of the favorite courses our staff have played over the past 12 months.

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I don’t remember the first time I played Rawls course at Texas Tech, but I remember it wasn’t enough a finished product. Well, the golf course was finished, but the facilities weren’t.

The pro shop was housed in a temporary trailer in the middle of a field and locker rooms were non-existent. You can pay for your round and have a quick beer there afterwards, but not much else. Regardless, as a high school kid, I didn’t need pretty objects to be in awe of. The course took care of that.

The course was built in the early 2000s in what was once an empty cotton field. Looking at the property now, you would have no idea that it was once a dull open field. When Tom Doak and his team were building Rawls, they moved 1.3 million yards of topsoil to form the course. What they created is one of the best public courses in the entire Lone Star State.

As a kid in Lubbock, Texas, just getting into the game, having the opportunity to learn how to play at Rawls was an invaluable experience. Not only is the course brutal from the back tee, but it also requires you to learn how to become a shot maker. With a west Texas wind blowing most days, hitting a shot is a rarity at Rawls.

Every day of high school, as soon as the afternoon bell rang, my friends and I would go to Rawls to practice. And while we joked a lot there, we also played some fiercely competitive games. To this day, there is no course that I know better than Rawls.

In the time I’ve been away from Lubbock, a lot has changed in the city – and the Rawls Course is no exception. Long gone is the temporary trailer shop, replaced by a massive club in its place. The Texas Tech golf teams have built a facility next to it, and their private practice areas extend beyond that. But the new structures are not the only improvements that have been made. The course has also received many improvements.

Conditions at Rawls have not always been good. There have been years when the greens were lost and others when the proper course care just wasn’t there. It’s not like that anymore. With Superintendent Jared Hotchkiss at the helm, conditions are better than ever.

But it’s not just conditioning that struck me when I visited Rawls on my last trip home. It was the changes they made to the course. Some of the bunkers have been softened and others removed to make some holes more playable for the higher handicap player. Not to mention, the slower green speeds they have maintained has provided more pin locations on the greens and allows the course to play much more like a Scottish links as originally envisioned.

I’m sure my parents won’t live in west Texas forever, but even after they leave, I’ll have to come back to Lubbock just to play the Rawls course. With the improvements they keep making there, can you blame me?