How former U.S. Open champion Scott Simpson ended up coaching at Hawai'i

February 26, 2023 | by Golfweek

Scott Simpson (Golfweek photo)

Why nice guys don't finish last and what happened to his Magnum P.I. mustache? Find out in this Golfweek Q&A with Scott Simpson

Scott Simpson has enjoyed success at nearly every stage of a golf career that spans six decades.

The 67-year-old won consecutive NCAA men’s golf titles (1976, 1977), was the recipient of the 1977 Fred Haskins Award as the best male collegiate golfer, played on a Walker Cup team (1977), won seven times on the PGA Tour, including the 1987 U.S. Open (in exactly 600 career starts), represented the Stars and Stripes in the Ryder Cup (1987) and picked a pretty good spot — Pebble Beach — for his one and only PGA Tour Champions triumph.

Simpson last played more than a handful of senior events in 2016 and called it quits in 2020 but as he told Golfweek during an interview at the 2023 Sony Open in Hawaii, he wasn’t the type to sit around in retirement and watch the grass grow.

Instead, after moving to Hawaii full-time in 2014, he volunteered at the local First Tee chapter and with the Hawaii State Junior Golf Association and dabbled in some coaching at the high school and college level before being named men’s coach of the University of Hawaii in 2021.

Imagine being coached by a winner of the U.S. Open.

“It’s so fun,” Simpson said. “Hopefully they’re learning some things and I don’t mess them up.”

Here’s more from a riveting conversation with Simpson, who discusses among other things how he ended up in Hawaii coaching the men’s golf team, why nice guys don’t finish last and what happened to his Magnum P.I. mustache.

Click here to read the entire Q&A with Scott Simpson by our Golfweek colleague Adam Shupack.

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