Cole Jaworski, a junior transfer from Spokane Community College, is no stranger to golf.

He grew up with a club in his hand learning from his dad, he said, and while golf wasn’t necessarily his favorite sport as a child, he would play on and off again.

For Jaworski, it wasn’t until middle school when he realized his passion for the sport and started taking the game more seriously.

“I liked playing with teams until I got to middle school when I phased out of every other sport and just stuck to golf,” Jaworski said.

Once Jaworski got to high school, he spent two seasons as a varsity member of the Coeur d’Alene High School golf team in Idaho. In 2019, he helped lead his team to a second-place conference finish.

At the end of his junior year, Jaworski had been named the USA Today Idaho Male Golfer of the year.

“Yeah, it was super cool to get that honor,” Jaworski said. “I didn’t even know what it was until I got an email saying I had won it, but super cool to see my play had been noticed.”

When the high school season stopped, that didn’t mean Jaworski did. He participated in 18 Washington Junior Golf Association events from 2018 to 2021. During this time, Jaworski had six top 25 finishes, seven top 10 finishes, a third-place finish and two first place finishes.

All that was left for Jaworski to do was find his next home to continue his academic and athletic career.

Despite having accolades like golfer of the year and winning conference championships, he didn’t have the offers that were expected.

“Coming out of high school, I didn’t have a huge recruiting,” Jaworski said. “Not a whole lot of people were coming after me.”

This left a chip on Jaworski’s shoulder, and he ended up deciding to stay close to home and going 30 miles west to Spokane Community College.

In his freshman year, he was named to the Northwest Athletic Conference All-Tournament team after placing third at the conference championship, shooting a 1-over-par 145 on 36 holes.

Jaworski’s performance led his team to a second-place finish in the NWAC championship.

In Jaworski’s sophomore season, he would end up placing 10th individually in the NWAC championship and second as a team.

Jaworski’s time in Spokane came to an end and would be looking for a new home. That’s when Eastern’s previous golf coach, Mike Moncel, was looking to fill his roster before retiring and reached out to Jaworski.

“I was weighting some options but defiantly liked the thought of competing at the highest level of college sports, and being [division] 1 was a big factor in coming here,” Jaworski said.

After moving over 1,800 miles, Jaworski arrived on campus. He didn’t waste any time finding local courses to go out and play.

“We’ve gone and played up at Atkins Country Club at the University of Illinois, Effingham Country Club and obviously Mattoon Country Club are some fun ones to play around here,” Jaworski said.

When going up divisions in sports, some worry if the production from an athlete will remain the same or get worse, but not for Jaworski. He used that same chip on his shoulder he had coming out of high school, however, this time it was the fact that Eastern was the only division 1 program to offer him a roster spot after his time at Spokane.

This fall, he went on to be the lowest scorer for the Panthers in two of their four tournaments, averaging 74.3 strokes per 18 holes.

This spring, Jaworski has been named as one of the Ohio Valley Conference preseason golfers to watch. In Eastern’s first tournament of the spring season, Jaworski lead the Panthers shooting 148 which was tied for 11th.

With Jaworski’s success and experience, Eastern head coach Craig Toler is looking for him to help the team continue to take the next steps and build a strong program for years to come.

“We have two juniors,” Toler said. “We’re relying on them and their experience to help out our younger guys and build up the program.”

Braden Boyer can be reached at 581-2812 or at bwboyer@eiu.edu.