This article originally ran in the March 2024 print issue of Sports Illustrated, and with Sam Bennett currently 30th in the Korn Ferry Tour standings entering this week's KFT Championship in French Lick, Ind., we wanted to share it here.
The house is quiet now. Sitting at the end of a dusty central Texas road, the air inside the stately brick ranch hangs still, no longer disturbed by the family of five careening through the halls en route to school or a dental office or golf courses. Echoes of those past lives are displayed on seemingly every wall, adorned by photos of a family smiling on ski trips, celebrating graduations or posing on the links. Slight of frame, eyes kind, the father in those photos stands proudly alongside his three young boys, his hands on their shoulders. Turn the corner into the living room, though, and he appears suddenly aged in a series of shots from his eldest son’s wedding: He hunches forward. His hair has whitened. His eyes have dimmed, unable to focus on the camera. Something’s changed. Something’s missing.
