Funny how some players arrive at their golfing epiphany.

Take Brandt Snedeker for instance. Prior to the start of the 2006 Nationwide Tour season Snedeker, a former All-America from Vanderbilt University with a world of ability and potential, was targeted as a player to be reckoned with, one supposedly on the cusp of a breakthrough. But in his first 13 events this year, Snedeker was more likely a candidate for a break down, nervous or otherwise.

Such is life when you post a mere nine sub-70 rounds in 45 trips to the first tee, when your best finish is a tie for 27th, when you’re buried on the money list, looking up at a grand total of 92 players. So Snedeker, 25, found himself in this unenviable position as the third round of the LaSalle Bank Open began three weeks ago just outside Chicago. He had made the cut on the number and, although striking the golf ball with precision, was getting absolutely zero for his effort.

“It’s hard to stay positive when everything seems not to be going your way,’’ he said.

The LaSalle Bank Open’s third round was so typical of his season. Snedeker striped it. Yet all he could produce was a Murphy’s Law 71 as putts lipped out, as balls hit in the fairway and bounded into the rough, as approach shots hit on greens and skipped merrily into hairy places where he was constantly short-sided.

Yet Snedeker came away convinced he was on the right track, a feeling seconded by his Sea Island, Ga., swing instructor Todd Anderson, whom Snedeker visited for a tune-up after he finished solo 68th.

“Todd told me everything was great,’’ Snedeker said. “So I guess I just decided to get out of my own way.’’

That’s when he made the decision to dance with the golf game that got him to the Nationwide Tour in the first place. That was the game where he played with cautious aggressiveness rather than reckless abandon, where he quit pressing where he would gladly settle for a 10-foot birdie putt rather than gun it at every pin.

“I decided I would stop trying to shoot 62 every round,’’ he said. “I figured that would take a lot of bogeys out of the equation.’’

And wouldn’t you know it? Snedeker figured right. He shot a 10-under-par 62 in the first round of last week’s Chattanooga Classic without trying.

Brandt Snedeker finished second at the Chattanooga Classic. (Badz/PGA TOUR/WireImage)

That glittering two-eagle, six-birdie, no-bogey round spawned a 26-under, 72-hole performance that would have been good enough to produce Snedeker’s first victory in two-plus seasons save for one little detail. Monday qualifier Kyle Reifers threw a course-record 61 at him in the final round. Nevertheless Snedeker showed his mettle by making an eagle on the 72nd hole to force a playoff that Reifers won with a 15-foot birdie putt on the first extra hole.

Despite the obvious disappointment, it appears Snedeker’s choo choo is on the right track after the Chattanooga Classic. He matched his best career finish and pocketed $51,300 to vault 60 players on the money list, putting himself in position -- at 33rd -- to make a serious run at PGA TOUR playing privileges in 2007.

Snedeker, a Nashville native, has his maternal grandmother to thank. She managed a golf course in West Plains, Mo., and introduced Snedeker and his older brother Haymes to golf then he was five. Although he played most all sports, Snedeker decided to pursue golf because he was “better at it’’ than baseball or basketball. He drew attention when he won an American Junior Golf Association event and figured he was signed, sealed and delivered to Ole Miss, where Haymes had earned All-SEC honors. But an 11th hour offer from Vanderbilt came along and it was one his parents insisted he could not refuse.

“Turned out to be the best situation for me,’’ Snedeker said, looking back. “I had four great years there and I truly value my degree (in communications). I kept improving every year.’’

Snedeker, who won the 2003 United States Public Links Championship, left Vanderbilt as a first-team All-American in 2004 and immediately turned professional, but not before making the cut in the Masters as an amateur that year.

His trial by fire came immediately as he played in eight PGA TOUR events. He made only three cuts with a best finish of a tie for 27th at the EDS Byron Nelson Championship. He then set out to Monday qualify on the Nationwide Tour. It took him two whole weeks to gain status thanks to a solo second at the Price Cutter Charity Championship. He made enough money in 11 events to gain status in 2005 and it served as the perfect fall back after he failed to make it through second stage of PGA TOUR Qualifying School. Snedeker looks back upon that failure as a blessing in disguise.

“I wasn’t ready for that,’’ he admitted. “The last two years out here have helped my maturation process immensely.’’

And as often is golf’s wont, the game taught him some humility as well. Snedeker appeared on target after three top-10 finishes in the first four Nationwide events of 2005. And it looked like he was ready to bag his first victory in Wisconsin in July when the golf gods intervened. A rib he cracked in West Virginia the week before wreaked havoc with his game in the final round in Wisconsin as he tumbled from first to a tie for 13th. He missed seven weeks, came back rusty, finished 45th on the money list and missed in second stage again.

“But that caused me to re-evaluate my game,’’ said Snedeker, who added Anderson to his teaching team that also included Virgil Herring.

The extra set of eyes is beginning to pay handsome dividends. Anderson coaxed Snedeker to remove excess movement from his swing, something that made him more stable. It took a while, but ball striking is improving and, after last week, so is his scoring.

“It has gotten better each week,’’ he said. “Everything is great right now.’’