High School Teacher In U.S. Open Field Lands Practice Round With Scottie Scheffler As Dream Week Continues

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There are unique, and downright feel-good stories during each and every major championship, and the story of amateur Colin Prater teeing it up in this week's U.S. Open at Pinehurst No. 2 certainly checks all of those boxes.

Prater was among the 9,522 players around the country who attempted to qualify for the U.S. Open and beat the odds, firing a 68-73 in final qualifying to be one of the 73 qualifiers to punch their ticket. That's an incredibly impressive feat in its own right, but especially for a high school biology teacher like Prater.

Prater is a biology teacher at Cheyenne Mountain High - where he also coaches the school's golf team - in Colorado Springs which tells you that he's a master of time management. He has a 20-month-old daughter at home as well, but somehow kept his game in good enough shape to play his way into the year's third major championship.

"My philosophy is keep the fundamentals sharp," he told GOLF. "I spend a ton of time chipping and putting."  

Players will have to showcase all sorts of shots around the greens of Pinehurst No. 2 this week if they're hoping to find any form of success.

Prater and his caddie, Cole Anderson, are wisely picking the brains of the best players in the world heading into Thursday's opening round. On Tuesday, Prater teed it up with fellow Coloradan and defending U.S. Open champion Wyndham Clark. After that memorable round, Anderson went back out on the course to pick up some notes from Jordan Spieth's caddie, Michael Greller.

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Playing alongside Clark and soaking up some knowledge from one of the best caddies in the business is special, but things are set to get even better for Prater on Wednesday as he's set to play a practice round with the No. 1 player in the world, Scottie Scheffler.

How the practice round came to be seems to be a bit of a mystery. It may have been Scheffler continuing his streak of being the nicest person in all of professional sports, but Prater thinks his caddie may have locked in the tee time when he met Ted Scott, Scheffler's caddie, early on in the week.

No matter how Prater plays, it's already been a memorable week for the high school biology teacher from Colorado.

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Mark covers all sports at OutKick while keeping a close eye on the world of professional golf. He graduated from the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga before earning his master's degree in journalism from the University of Tennessee. He somehow survived living in Knoxville despite ‘Rocky Top’ being his least favorite song ever written. Before joining OutKick, he wrote for various outlets including SB Nation, The Spun, and BroBible. Mark was also a writer for the Chicago Cubs Double-A affiliate in 2016 when the team won the World Series. He's still waiting for his championship ring to arrive. Follow him on Twitter @itismarkharris.