HAILSTATEBEAT: Dusty Smith Leads New Era Of Men's Golf At MSU

In middle school, Dusty Smith stood all of 4 feet and 11 inches tall. He'd been swinging a golf club his whole life, first taught by his dad, but unfortunately, while everyone around him was hitting growth spurts, it just wasn't happening for Smith. But hey, at least he didn't have to spend money on new clubs all the time.

What he lacked in stature, however, Smith made up for in effort and passion. He might not have had the most power as he continued on into high school, but that just meant he cared even more about mechanics, about his short game, about all the details that can make a good golfer great.

"To be honest with you," he confessed, "I wasn't very good. I didn't hit the ball very far, but I always had a pretty good short game and could always find my way."

Smith kept at it, though. He kept practicing, kept training, kept learning, and most importantly, he never stopped trying. By his junior year, he actually made the varsity golf team at his populous high school in The Woodlands, Texas, and that year, Smith was the fifth man on the state championship team. As a senior they finished as the runner-ups.

The young golfer had grown taller, of course, since 7^th grade, but he still wasn't a hot commodity when it came to being recruited by colleges. Ultimately, Smith signed with a small Division-I college named Lamar that had never even been to the postseason. Not yet, anyway. By Smith's junior year, Lamar made an appearance in their first-ever NCAA Championships, finishing 9^th in the country. As a senior, Smith and his teammates returned to the postseason, that time finishing third in the NCAA Championships behind only Stanford and Georgia.

And thanks to his dedication to the craft, Smith was an All-American who went on to play professionally for the next two years and change.

Now in his first year as the head coach of Mississippi State's men's golf program, Smith is approaching the job with the same attitude that got him so far as a player.

"That's kind of the mentality that I've brought to coaching." He said. "You obviously want the top recruits in the country to come to your program, but you also want to find guys who might have been overlooked, who carry that little chip on their shoulder, who are going to get down and work and get better and be coachable."

The college game was always where Smith was going to end up. As soon as he left it following his final season at Lamar, things were no longer the same. Golf was still fun, of course, but he missed the camaraderie of being on a team, of traveling with a group of friends and of being able to help others. Smith elected to give up playing professionally to get into coaching, returning to his alma mater as an assistant coach for both the men's and women's programs.

With his help, the men's team advanced to an NCAA Regional in all three of his years there, while earning eight All-Conference honors, including the Southland Player of the Year in 2011.

The following season, he joined national powerhouse Vanderbilt to become the top assistant for head coach Scott Limbaugh. During his six seasons in Nashville, the Commodores won 12 team tournament titles, had seven All-Americans and earned 11 All-SEC selections. The Commodores went to a program-best four-straight NCAA Tournaments in Smith's last four years there, thanks in no small part to his tutelage and recruiting.

Now in Starkville, the principles he learned from Limbaugh are the foundations for the program he's building, beginning most importantly with a player-first approach.

"I really learned most of the way I coach from him," Smith said. "He loved his players. He cared for his players. But he also held them to the highest possible standard and he got the most out of his players. When I came in here, obviously, my No. 1 goal was just to get to know the players, get to know their hearts, get to know what makes them tick, what motivates them, what doesn't motivate them. Every athlete is different. Some of them you can get on to, but others you have to be more careful and go about it a different way. I'd say we have one clear message, and then within that message, we coach each individual differently."

In fact, it was even Limbaugh who helped Smith end up at MSU. Over the years at Vandy, Smith had plenty of offers to become the head coach of his own program, but Limbaugh advised his assistant to be patient and be picky. People were going to notice what he was doing and the right offer was going to come along. This spring when Smith found out at that MSU was in the market for a new coach, he and Limbaugh agreed: this was the one.

So when Smith came to Starkville for his interview and was blown away by the facilities and the people, saying yes to the soon-to-come offer to be the next head coach at Mississippi State was an easy and obvious decision. Now, his goal is to show the rest of the country what he sees at MSU.

"This is the best kept secret in the United States," Smith said, "and it's not going to be kept a secret any longer because, I feel like, if you bring a prospect out to our facilities, it's going to be tough for them to say no.

"The response has been really, really good in recruiting," he continued. "Every kid we get on campus is blown away by the facilities and what we have to offer and our coaching philosophy."

And already, the building has begun, the Bulldogs now in the midst of their fall season, their first days of competition under Smith. The program is just beginning to take shape.

"I'm a big process guy. Be better today than you were yesterday and be better tomorrow than you are today. Stick to the process, stick to the steps. In golf, you can't skip steps," Smith said. "Our goal is just getting better each and every day. We focus on our brand of golf which is being tough, being disciplined, being gritty, staying in the process, being a team player. When I refer to the Mississippi State brand of golf, that's what I'm talking about. "

Mississippi State University Athletics

HAILSTATEBEAT: Dusty Smith Leads New Era Of Men's Golf At MSU

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