Stepping in the tee box on the tree-lined 17th hole at Winthrop Meadows in Rock Hill, South Carolina, during the D3 College Disc Golf Championship, Aaron Walker had 700-feet of fairway surrounded by hazards and out-of-bounds penalty areas in front of him. The pressure was on for him to execute the dangerous shot to preserve a thin lead to win his team’s first national championship.

With a stable disc in his hand, Walker walked to the tee confidently and delivered a 500-plus-foot backhand shot. If the shot landed anywhere else but the thin strip of fairway, the team would’ve seen their lead evaporate in the final two holes of the tournament.

The mid-height drive started its flight over the right side out-of-bounds. The disc skirted the line the entire way and then softly faded left, back into the field of play. Walker’s teammates let out a big roar, jumping up and down and embracing him as the momentum they needed swung their way for the final push.

“It was surreal,” Walker said. “We all knew we had a chance, but to actually do it was more than we could ask for.”

It was the first national championship for Milligan University in Elizabethton, Tennessee. Walker and teammates Mitchell Moll, James Blocker and Owen Gibson led from start to finish in the Division III victory. Teams, rather than schools, qualify for divisions based on Professional Disc Golf Association ratings.

Walker, who grew up in Powell until age 14, chose the university out of several colleges offering disc golf as a sport because he also was determined to attend a Christian college. He had originally wanted to go to Liberty University, which already has a legacy of champions in the sport, but when Milligan offered him a five-digit scholarship he decided he would visit the campus.

“I fell in love when I went there,” the tall, bearded redhead said.

His father Chris, got him into competition, he said, but at first it was just “a family thing to do” after they moved to Idaho.

“There was an actual course with metal baskets and stuff like that in the area. Dad was like, ‘we’re going to do this,’” Walker said. “And so we started at the same time.”

Chris watched him honing his skills in disc golf every day in the 7-acre wooded parcel behind their home. Nothing could stop his son’s obsession. Chris has memories of Aaron grabbing a shovel, heading back to the tree line and clearing off the tee boxes and fairways of their home course so he could practice during the harsh winters. At that time the family didn’t even know scholarships were available to play the quickly growing sport, let alone imagine his son playing for a national title.

An expert at breaking down the mechanics of throwing fast, Chris started out as the top disc player in the family. He could throw a 300-foot sidearm shot from day one and quickly improved. He trained his son on technique and accuracy while they explored the sport together. It wasn’t long before Aaron started telling his father that he was about to lose the advantage.

“He warned me he was going to finally throw further than me. I think that was in 2022,” Chris said. “By the end of summer leagues he never looked back.”

When Aaron left home for the first time and headed down the long road to Elizabethton, Tennessee, Chris couldn’t stand the thought of missing his son’s events. He was a college and semi-pro baseball pitcher and knows how important it was to have had his family’s support — especially his father at his games. Soon, Chris was on the way to Tennessee.

With a remote job as the Veterans Liaison for Northwest Battle Buddies (he used to operate Triple A Dog Training in Powell), Chris was lucky enough to be able to follow in his own father’s footsteps and be there for Aaron.

The lessons haven’t stopped. The father and son duo are now working on the “mental game” of competition.

Disc golf is experiencing a period of rapid growth. Participation has increased significantly in recent years, with a 76% rise in the last five years. This growth is fueled by the addition of new courses, with over 1,000 installed annually for the past five years, according to Disc Golf Course Review.

Tennessee is home to many great courses. Former U.S. professional disc golf champion Chris Dickerson and top pro tour player Zach Melton developed their talents in the Tennessee woods. As a bonus for Milligan players, both pros spend a lot of time with the team and Melton is an assistant coach.

The influences of a tight team, seasoned pros and a head coach who not only cares about athletic talent, but solid educational discipline as well have helped Walker grow, not only as a golfer but also a mature, responsible adult.

“We’ve been working with him a lot, and he’s improving leaps and bounds. His rating keeps going up. He’s winning local tournaments. You know, they won the national title in D3 and he was a big part of that,” said Milligan coach Tim Barr.

Barr is also impressed with Walker’s class work ethic. The senior is a top student and has been on the Dean’s List every semester.

“In my opinion, he’s doing it the right way. He’s getting his degree first, and he was young when I took him on as a freshman, just barely 17. Once he graduates he’ll still have all his skills unless something out of the ordinary happens, and he will also have that degree that he can fall back on, you know, if the tour life doesn’t work out,” he said.

That’s right, Coach Barr said ‘tour life.’ Aaron will graduate with his four-year degree in English with minors in Humanities and Professional Writing before he turns 20. He hopes to have his master’s degree in Humanities before he leaves Milligan. Luckily, he still has three years of eligibility left before he dons his post-graduate robe and mortar board.

Once he finishes his education, Aaron hopes to work as a book editor while touring on the Professional Disc Golf Tour. Once there (not an easy feat), the average disc golfer finds a grueling schedule of tournaments — trying to do well enough to win gas and food money. There have been some young phenoms that have made an instant impact on the tour, like Gannon Buhr of Iowa and Anthony Barela of Arizona, but that is far from the average.

Many players travel and live in their vehicles. Yet, as the sport grows, so do tournament winnings and sponsorships. Some of the top players, like six-time world champ Paul McBeth and two-time world champion Richard “Ricky” Wysocki, have made many hundreds of thousands of dollars in career tournament wins and have also signed multi-million dollar contracts with their disc equipment sponsors.

As the sport grows, the stakes grow as well for both men and women on the tour. Paige Pierce recently passed $400,000 in career earnings (not to mention her sponsorships) for the first time. The average annual pay for a Disc Golf Professional in the United States makes $63,862 a year, according to ZIP Recruiter.

Aaron wants it all. His goals are high, but he has a solid plan for his ascent — if it’s in the cards.

Returning home

Chris and Aaron returned to Powell last week to visit Aaron’s sibling Andrew, who is studying at Northwest College after a stint in the Army. The first thing Aaron did was line up a round at NWC’s Dee Havig Disc Golf Course.

His tee time just happened to coincide with the Park County Disc Golf Club’s league night on the campus. Aaron and Andrew joined the club for the round. From the first throws it was apparent Aaron has a boom stick for an arm.

The recently crowned champion went on to tie Jay Hecht’s club course record of 10-under on his first trip around the course. Considering the champ showed up with two discs (serious players often carry more than two dozen) and both of those were putters (traditionally used for short shots), his score could have been much lower.

Hecht was on hand for the round, finishing second with a 6-under. He was lucky enough to have Walker give him advice on his form and mechanics. It’s rare to have a player of his caliber in Powell.

Walker remembers playing object disc golf with his father in Powell. Back then they didn’t have the right discs — just old school frisbees. They would use mature trees at Southside Park as the targets. He’s holding on to memories of fishing in the cement pond at Homesteader Park and target shooting up on the bench. But most of what he misses are the friends he made while growing up in Wyoming.

“Spending time with the friends I had there was one of the things that I loved so much,” he said.