Scott Schroeder remembers the conversation like it was yesterday. Because it practically was yesterday.

The men’s golf coach at the University of North Florida had lunch with Philip Knowles at the Sierra Grille in Jacksonville Beach because they needed to chat. Not about anything serious. Schroeder keeps tabs on all of his former players, and it was time to touch base.

So the two men, along with UNF assistant coach Jeff Dennis and Schroeder’s daughter Kaitlyn, a junior golf standout, got together to discuss Knowles’ season on the Korn Ferry Tour. They planned the next month and went over various scenarios that could play out between then and the time the season ended on Sept. 4.

That lunch meeting was on July 26. Twenty-six days later, Knowles had earned a PGA TOUR card.

“It wasn’t highest on the list, him having his TOUR card,” Schroeder said. “We were talking about him playing his best in these last few events and seeing what happened.”

“We talked about trying to have a good two weeks,” Knowles said. “We were just catching up, having a fun conversation. Not really were we ever seriously considering that I’d be in Napa a month-and-a-half from then.”

Napa, as in the Fortinet Championship, where Knowles made his debut as a TOUR member in September.

Knowles, 26, finished the Korn Ferry Tour Regular Season at No. 68 in points and was pleased with that position, knowing that he had a solid place to play for the next season. After all, he had signed up for Q-School before finishing T10 at the Regular Season-ending Pinnacle Bank Championship presented by Aetna to keep full status and gain access to the Korn Ferry Tour Finals.

The following week at the Albertsons Boise Open presented by Chevron, the first of three Finals events, Knowles led for 71 holes and ultimately earned a PGA TOUR card via his second-place tie. (Will Gordon defeated Knowles and MJ Daffue on the first playoff hole.)

Knowles was one of 25 players to earn a TOUR card via the three-event Finals; this year marked the final iteration of The Finals 25. The PGA TOUR qualifying structure is changing into 2023; rather than 25 TOUR cards via the season-long Korn Ferry Tour standings (The 25) and 25 cards via the Finals standings (The Finals 25), the structure of the Finals as a melting pot of TOUR pros, Korn Ferry Tour pros and non-members is no longer. Thirty TOUR cards will be awarded via the season-long standings, in addition to 10 cards from the DP World Tour, five and ties from Q-School, and the No. 1 player on the PGA TOUR University Velocity Global Ranking. Moving forward, the Korn Ferry Tour Finals will be part of the season-long race to determine TOUR cards.

Knowles knew the Finals structure in place from 2013-2022 was, in his words, “the easiest way to get a TOUR card.” He earned his opportunity in Boise, and he delivered.

“I couldn’t sleep Sunday night,” Knowles admitted. “Got three hours of sleep. I was thinking about all of the things I wished I had done differently. We play golf to win, not to just get a TOUR card. I was blowing the field away for half the tournament.

“There’s not a whole lot I would do differently. If you’d have told me standing on the first tee in Omaha (the first round of the Pinnacle Bank Championship the week prior), that in the end of Indiana (the Korn Ferry Tour Championship presented by United Leasing & Finance) I’d have a PGA TOUR card, I’d have asked you how much I needed to pay and where do I sign. At the end of the day, I would’ve taken it before I ever played. It stings not winning though, because I’m a huge competitor and I want to win.”

“It’s a great sign of even more things to come,” Schroeder said. “He led for 71 holes. That’s a hard thing to do in professional golf.”

Before moving forward, it’s important to look back to the beginning of the season. Because the past year for Knowles have been of the roller-coaster variety.

Knowles’ status was not enough to get him into the first four Korn Ferry Tour events of the season, but he received a sponsor exemption into the fifth – the LECOM Suncoast Classic, which was played in Lakewood Ranch, Florida, near his Bradenton hometown.

With a carefree attitude and a thankful disposition, Knowles came out firing with 67-66 in the first two rounds and advanced to the weekend for the first time in Korn Ferry Tour competition. The next week he made the cut at the Lake Charles Championship after Monday qualifying and suddenly was positioned to shuffle into more events.

However, just as quickly as Knowles moved into the mix, he promptly missed four consecutive cuts and was not able to produce any consistency.

“The reshuffle happened, then I missed my next four cuts, which was all the way up to the next reshuffle,” Knowles said. “I felt like I was getting closer, then all of a sudden I was not.”

After that cold spell, Knowles came out firing and made 10 of his next 11 cuts, including three top-15s in his final seven starts of the Regular Season. The next week was his close call in Boise to earn TOUR membership. (Knowles missed the cut the following week, calling it “easy to swallow” and ended the season with a T17the Korn Ferry Tour Championship.) He has made three cuts in seven starts as a TOUR rookie and enters the holiday break at No. 165 on the FedExCup.

“Korn Ferry (Tour) Finals is crazy,” Knowles said. “It’s the easiest way to get a TOUR card. You don’t have to go through the grind of the full season. I played half the events, haven’t won yet and I have my TOUR card. There’s such a fine line. Having a full Korn Ferry card next year would’ve been great, but it wouldn’t have been life changing.”

Schroeder remembers recruiting Knowles as a junior golfer. He identified him early as someone he wanted to come play for the Ospreys. Schroeder and his assistant watched Knowles play 99 holes in a five-day stretch during the 2014 Florida State Match Play, which Knowles won.

“He always hated to lose, and that fit my mentality,” Schroeder said. “It won’t surprise me to see him out there for a long time because of all that.”

Once in Jacksonville, Knowles won three college events during his four-year stay and improved consistently each year, ending his senior year as the Atlantic Sun Conference Player of the Year and ranked inside the top 20 in the country. Schroeder says that Knowles’ competitive nature is off the charts and that, even though he’s not overly vocal, he’s always hated to lose at anything. Growing up one of six siblings, in a highly competitive family certainly helped hone the skill.

Until now, Knowles’ fledgling professional career had been a mixed bag. He’s dabbled on the Korn Ferry Tour, PGA TOUR Canada and PGA TOUR Latinoamerica. He never had enough status to get into a flurry of events to see what he could do with consistent reps.

Finally in summer 2021, Knowles won on PGA TOUR Canada (played that year as the Forme Tour), shooting 67-66-65-67 at the Auburn University Club Invitational. He lists that as his biggest victory. But again, he followed that result with four consecutive missed cuts before ultimately closing with a T12 and T33 to earn 2022 Korn Ferry Tour status at No. 7 on the season-long standings.

So much has changed for Knowles over the past few months that it seems like it’d be easy to be overwhelmed. His wife Olivia, whom he met in high school at Bradenton Christian when she qualified to play on the boys’ golf team, is pregnant with their first child, a daughter due in January. Together they relied on their Christian faith to get them through the past few years of young marriage and life on the road as a professional golfer without knowing precisely where the next start would come from. They’ll rely on that same faith now to help them navigate the fresh waters ahead.

The scouting report on Knowles says his strength is driving the ball. Even he admits that his prowess won’t necessarily impress anyone, and the ball doesn’t go great distances, but it’s functional and he can work it left-to-right about 90% of the time. He’s a strong wedge player too. His putter is streaky, he said, and when he plays his most inconsistent golf it’s because of his iron play.

Schroeder calls Knowles a plodder and extremely level-headed, and that Knowles’ game has improved every year he’s known him. Both men believe PGA TOUR course setups will fit Knowles’ game.

“The results may not always appear like he’s getting better, but he has,” Schroeder said. “He’s going to have stretches where he plays a lot of good golf. He’ll rarely take a step backward. That’ll be fun to watch on his next journey on the TOUR.”

Journey. It’s a word both Schroeder and Knowles use often. Knowles is the first player who Schroeder has coached to earn a PGA TOUR card. Although Knowles earned that status in the most unlikely of ways, he believes he’s where he should be and believes his unique path has prepared him for the next step playing against the best in the world.

“Now I stand here with an opportunity to play on the PGA TOUR. Amazing,” Knowles said. “A few good weeks have changed my life and a few more can continue to change it. Who knows where we could be sitting a year from now. I’m excited. Totally clueless, but excited nonetheless. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”