ATLANTA – Colin Swatton can remember the moment with impressive clarity given that memories tend to fade with time and the seemingly mundane conversation occurred nearly a decade ago.
It was the afternoon when Jason Day, a then-16-year-old wunderkind, wandered into Swatton’s office at Kooralbyn International School with a curious question for even the most accomplished professionals at the time.
“Do you think I can get to world No. 1?” Day asked.
Consider at that moment Tiger Woods held the top spot in the Official World Golf Ranking by a commanding margin, nearly two average ranking points over Ernie Els, and that Day – who Swatton now concedes wasn’t even his most talented student at Kooralbyn, a sports-specific institution just outside of Brisbane, Australia – was fresh off his most high-profile victory at the World Junior Championship at Torrey Pines.