Nearly two dozen teens quickly shuffled into a meeting room on the 26th floor of Accenture Tower in downtown Chicago, eagerly waiting to see which member of the PGA Tour would be hanging out for the evening. The attendees at the First Tee Teen Tank event were told the evening’s guest would be a surprise. They hardly noticed he was already standing in the room among them, though that wasn’t exactly Neal Shipley’s fault.
Shipley has plenty of name recognition these days. Before the 24-year-old earned full-time status on the PGA Tour in August, he’d already become a cult hero at the game’s highest level. Shipley burst onto the national scene as the low amateur at The Masters in 2024, repeating the feat at the U.S. Open a few months later and getting a feature in Netflix’s Full Swing the following year.
The problem on this Friday night in early December was that Shipley simply looked more like one of the teenagers than a grizzled Tour stalwart. That might also help explain why the teens from The First Tee Greater Chicago were peppering him with questions and hanging on every word.
Not too long ago, Shipley was a Pittsburgh high schooler trying to define his path. At the First Tee Teen Tank, his audience was attempting to do the same through the Accenture Innovation Hub.
The teens, aged 13-18, spent the evening exploring the IT firm’s sleek offices with panoramic views of the loop as they work towards their Teen Tank presentations — a riff on Shark Tank that places contestants into small groups to pitch tech-powered projects to Accenture leaders.
Which made Shipley, who earned a Masters in data analytics from Ohio State after studying quantitative finance as an undergrad at James Madison, a perfect fit for the evening’s main event.
“If I were sitting in your shoes and someone had told me ‘Hey, you’re going to be on Tour in six years’ I would’ve thought they were crazy,” Shipley told the room. “I was not on that path necessarily out of high school. It was always a goal of mine and I wanted it. I think the journey might not always look how you want it to, but the journey to your goals is not a straight line.”
Shipley reminded the group he wasn’t the No. 1 recruit out of high school, nor was he in the top-200. He said he felt lucky to end up at James Madison and used the opportunity to work and learn.
“I spent a lot of hours on the range,” Shipley said. “But I also listened to my mentors. I think leaning on people close to you that you trust is really important. Finding the right people to lean on, too.”
It’s a lesson that fits right in with the mission of The First Tee, which seeks to teach life skills through golf. And this being first and foremost a golf outing, the teens weren’t going to let Shipley just share life lessons. They wanted the gossip, too.
Asked about the most nerve-wracking tee shots he’s hit, Shipley couldn’t help but crack a smile as he called teeing off on Thursday at the Masters in 2024 the second-most nervous tee shot of his life.
“My No. 1 most-nervous was the first tee shot with Tiger that Sunday.” Shipley laughed. “That was out-of-body.”
There should be plenty more out-of-body experiences to come for Shipley this season. After securing his Tour card, the Pittsburgh native expects to play as many tournaments as he can, beginning with the Sony Open in Hawaii next month.
Back in Chicago, The First Tee Teen Tank will be prepping for their presentations the following month in February. All of them are hoping to secure a big green prize by April and realize their potential.
Story first published in Golfweek