Steph Curry’s Underrated Golf Tour Makes First Stop in Gainesville
After winning the inaugural Curry Cup at 13 years old and her second in 2025, Ashley Shaw set a higher bar for her fifth and final Underrated Golf Tour: stay undefeated. The 17-year-old got one step closer to her goal Thursday, winning the Girls Division in Gainesville at the tour’s first stop of the 2026 season.
Backed by four-time NBA champion Stephen Curry, the tour launched in 2022, aiming to expand access to the sport, covering any related expenses (fees, food and transportation) for its participants, ranging from 12 to 18 years old. Competitors arrived last Monday and took to the Mark Bostick Course at the University of Florida Tuesday through Thursday.
The competitive golfers play three more times across July and August before the top 28 male and female athletes play for the Curry Cup. Throughout the four-day regional events, participants network with brands and corporations and listen to guest speakers.
During its inaugural season, 48 golfers competed, but Underrated Tour Ambassador Will Lowery said the tour now fields nearly 100. Shaw’s been on the tour since the beginning and appreciates the organization’s commitment to covering costs.
“That means so much,” Shaw said. “There are not many tournaments that do that, but you can easily spend [at least] $8,000 per tournament just because [of the] rental car, the flights, the food. And especially if [it’s] my dad, my mom, and myself, it gets pretty pricey. So having a tour that covers everything for us and allows you to just go out there and focus simply on playing golf is phenomenal.”
Shaw, a University of Georgia commit, started playing golf at 7 years old after her father bought her clubs, and the sport quickly became a source of family time. Shaw’s mother, Sylvia Shaw, who doubles as her coach and caddie, accompanied her to Gainesville.
As the only golfer in the family, the Litchfield Park, Arizona, native emphasized the sacrifices her parents made to support her career, with her mom putting in countless hours to study the game and her dad often missing tournaments for work. She has relied on her mom as a lucky charm ever since Sylvia filled in as her caddie early into Shaw’s golfing journey.
“[My mom] said I cried when I was told that she had to caddie for me and not in a good way but we went out and I shot 3-under the first day and 7-under the next day,” Shaw said. “I was like, ‘You’re caddying for me from now on,’ [and] ever since then, she’s caddied for me.”
The tour’s aim to expand access resonates with two-time tour competitor Ava Saavedra, whose parents often balance tournament and practice travel with taking her brother, who has Down syndrome, to appointments.
The incoming Circle Christian High School senior valued the opportunity to hear from Florida men’s golf coach J.C. Deacon on Tuesday.
“He gave us a lot of really good advice,” Saavedra said. “He said a lot of things about practice that I can use in my own practice, things I can use in the future like how I react on the golf course, how I handle my emotions and how I direct myself towards people off the golf course.”
After Wednesday’s first round, Lowery advised Boys Division winner Lucas Gimenez to slow his process down. As the 17-year-old walked from the first tee box, Lowery’s advice clicked, helping him shoot 5-under 65 to end the regional at 5-under 135 for his first regional win.
The University of Oklahoma commit joined the tour four years ago and took advantage of the available networking opportunities, becoming an ambassador for Del Campo Socks, a sock company in Jacksonville, his hometown. Founded by former Florida Gators kicker Zack Brust, the company partnered with Underrated for the 2026 tour, allowing Gimenez to rep the company on the course.
A quarter of the way through his final Underrated tour, he wants to hold onto the community he discovered.
“You build a lot of friendships and relationships and meet a lot of awesome people,” Gimenez said. “Communicating with people is very important on the tour. My first stop, I didn’t really talk to anyone [because] I didn’t know too many people, so I was just kind of laid back, but then I started talking to people and then heading into the next year [when] I showed up and I knew people there.”
Like Shaw, Duncan Reid joined the tour during its first season with his brother, Thomas Reid, who started at Southern University and A&M College in 2024. The growth in level of talent stood out to the Alabama A&M University commit, but he finds the expansion of the tour’s family more impressive.
“The best thing about Underrated is that we’re all in kind of different friend groups, but we’re all one family and we always welcome the new members and they become part of our friend groups,” Reid said. “That’s really evolved because at the beginning we didn’t really know each other and it was kind of separate, but now it’s really a family.”
Sylvia said the tour exposes golfers like Shaw to challenging courses across the country. The next three stops include Troon North Golf Club (Scottsdale, Arizona), Seaview Country Club (Galloway, New Jersey) and Hillcrest Country Club (Los Angeles).
While Thursday’s win marked Shaw’s third straight regional win on the tour, her 2022 Curry Cup win still makes her mom emotional.
“When I look back at the video when she dropped that last putt, it still brings tears to my eyes just because she works so hard and all of these kids do,” Sylvia said. “When you see yours out there every day grinding, and you see the days when it all comes together, it is very meaningful.”
Shaw will soak in the win but wants to finish the job.
“I definitely came in here wanting to win,” Shaw said. “My goal is to win all four [and] no one’s done that before [so] I know it’s a bit of a stretch, but that’s definitely my goal.
“And to win the Curry Cup one more time because I’m going to [school a] year early, so I want to get one more Curry Cup win before I go and leave the tour on a bang.”
Category: Feature Sports News, High School Sports
