Athlete Of The Week: Raymond Knoll

Junior Raymond Knoll, 's top returning golfer from last year's third-place team at state, took some time out from his busy schedule Wednesday night to answer a few questions for Naperville Patch's Athlete of the Week series.

Knoll's Huskies beat Wheaton North earlier Wednesday at Arrowhead Golf Club in Wheaton, led partly by Knoll's 37. Last year, Knoll finished fifth overall at the Class 3A state tournament and anything's possible again this year.

First, do you go by Raymond, or do you have a nickname? Raymie. I've kind of had that since I was really little. This girl I used to play golf with, she goes to , her dad gave me that. 

Any nicknames for any of your clubs? No, not really. I've kind of joked around about it, like called my putter just like random stuff, but not really anything like actual.

What's the last fun club-head cover  you've had in the bag? Now I have a Huskies head cover. (Prior), I had gotten this gift card from some tournament or whatever, and I thought I should hold onto that gift card to buy a T-shirt or like a golf shirt with it. But instead, I took it to Cantigny one day and I bought this head cover which was a golf ball that had all these goofy legs sticking out of it and it had arms and it had this weird hat. It was the funniest head cover. But the funniest part about it was the area that you put the (driver) into.

On the course, is there anything you must have on you or in your bag in order to compete? You know, good-luck charms? Let's see. I used to have this little ball mark. It had a cross on it and it said — it was from the Bible — (John 3:16) on it and it had a saying at the top. I don't remember what the saying said, but I used to always stick it in my back pocket, just used to have it with me all the time. I had it in my pocket for every tournament.

Did you end up losing it? Yeah. I brought it to school one day and, I don’t know, I just lost it.

What about superstitions? My pre-shot routine, it has to be perfect every time or else I feel like I'm going to hit a really bad shot. Every time I step up to the ball it's like I have to take three swings, take a deep breath and visualize the shot and then I just go from there. And every time I don't do that, I just feel like I didn't prepare myself for the shot and I'm going to hit a bad shot. It's kind of like my big superstition.

How do golfers miss putts inside of three feet. Really, what can possibly go wrong? Definitely, the thing with golfers and short putts like that, it's 100 percent mental. Like, they're just thinking way too much about it instead of just going through motions and just hitting the putt. They're just thinking way too much about it.

What's the most spectacular shot you've ever witnessed? Oh God, there's so many. One of the coolest shots I've ever seen was actually kind of funny because I was playing with my cousin, Rob Leonard, he's on the golf team now. We were on the seventh hole at Springbrook — we were just playing around or whatever. It was like 170 yards, I think he hit a 5-iron. He was standing up over the ball and I was like, “Hey Rob — I want you to get a hole-in-one right here.” He looked at me and smiled, and he had only been playing golf for like 11 months or maybe a year. And he just steps up and he just hits the most pure shot ever, and it was like five feet in front of the cup and (rolls up) and goes around the edge of the cup, lips out, goes around the edge of the cup and stops on the edge. It was so cool.

If you were a club, which club would you be? Why? I would be the putter, because the putter's always there in like the biggest moments. And like tapping in for par to win like the Masters or whatever, you always use the putter. And because the putter's the most important part of the game.

Finally, are you still a fan of Tiger Woods, figuring you and everyone else was at some point? Yeah, I love him. The thing with Tiger is just it's really hard to watch him. ... Just knowing all the stuff he's done in the past, just seeing him struggle, how he is, it's hard to watch. I mean, it's hard to watch. I never really like — I don't know how to say this — I never really like forgave him for what he did with his family ... but at the same time he's Tiger and he's still one of the greatest players of all time. I just like watching him play well, and I'm still a fan of his.