Gary Woodland joins Chamberlain, Manning and other greats in Kansas Hall of Fame
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Gary Woodland joins KU Athletics Hall of Fame alongside Chamberlain and Manning.
- Woodland thanks KU for support during health recovery and PGA Tour comeback.
- Woodland preps for 2025 Ryder Cup as vice captain amid renewed career momentum.
Standing in front of a large number of current and former University of Kansas golfers and members of the KU athletic department, as well as family, friends and donors, Gary Woodland donned his new Kansas Athletics Hall of Fame sweater before delivering an emotional induction speech on Friday in the golf complex at The Jayhawk Club that bears his name.
Woodland, a PGA Tour veteran who won the 2019 U.S. Open, shed tears as he gained admittance into the KU Hall at the age of 41.
“KU gave me that opportunity to be recognized for this and for what I’ve been able to do. It means the world to me,” said Woodland, a native of Topeka who competed at KU from 2004 to 2007 before embarking on his pro career.
“I love this place. I love everything about it, and this is special to have my name engraved into their history forever,” Woodland added.
A frequent visitor to KU basketball games, Woodland has more than once viewed all the pictures of KU Athletics Hall of Fame inductees on a wall in the Booth Family Hall of Athletics in Allen Fieldhouse.
“I think when you come back and you walk through the Hall of Fame, you wish you’d get in there someday, but you never know, right?” Woodland told a group of reporters after the induction ceremony.
“KU has got some amazing athletes. There’s some big names in that Hall of Fame. I’ll say how proud I am to have my name in there, to be able to walk my kids through there when I come back for a game and show them that anything’s possible. Pretty cool,” he added.
In announcing the enshrinement of Woodland, KU athletic director Travis Goff, mentioned Woodland — the four-time PGA Tour winner, who is in the midst of a comeback from 2023 brain surgery — in the same breath as Wilt Chamberlain, Gale Sayers, Danny Manning, Lynette Woodard and other Kansas Jayhawk greats.
“That’s probably too much for me. These are guys that I look (up to),” Woodland said. “I mean I met Jacque Vaughn (former KU and NBA guard now a KU assistant basketball coach) last night. He was one of my favorites. Danny was my favorite. Jacque took over after that when he came through. Just to have my name even associated, thrown, around in the same sentence. Is special. Those guys are still up on my Mount Rushmore. I’m still looking up at all those guys.”
Woodland, who joined the PGA Tour in 2009, has 30 top-five finishes and 56 top-10s in nearly 300 career starts on the PGA Tour. Woodland captured the 2019 U.S. Open title at Pebble Beach at 13-under par. He shot rounds of 68-65-69-69 to win his first major tournament by outlasting multi-time major winner Brooks Kopeka by 3 strokes.
His other PGA wins are the 2011 Transitions Championship, the 2013 Reno-Tahoe Open and the 2018 Waste Management Phoenix Open.
In July, Woodland, recipient of the 2025 PGA Tour Courage Award, was named a vice captain for the 45th Ryder Cup, which will start Tuesday at Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, New York.
“I’m pumped for next week. It’s going to be a big deal,” Woodland said. “We’re headed up there tomorrow. The team’s getting in the next day, but it’s been a special part of this process the last couple months, to get to know the guys on a deeper level. It’s in Bethpage in New York. It’s gonna be absolute madness. The weather’s going to be perfect. So it’s going to be a lot, but we got some young guys coming in there. We’re trying to get them ready for what to expect. But it’s, it should be a special week. I’m looking forward to it.”
Woodland, who was pleased with his play on the tour this past year amid his comeback, is especially looking forward to the 2026 golf season.
“This week was a big step in the right direction,” he said on Friday. “I’ve been struggling for a couple years now. Usually when guys get older, they lose their speed and their putting. I had statistically my best putting year of my career. My speed was extremely up, so I’m excited about my future. I still have some hurdles to get over from a health standpoint, but I’m going to take it easy the rest of this fall, get healthy and I look forward to even a bigger and better year next year.”
He said he is grateful that KU has assisted him greatly in his fight to recover from surgery.
“KU has helped me. They’ve gotten me in with doctors. They’ve helped me through this medical process when they didn’t have to,” Woodland said. “I’ve graduated. I’m not even living here, but I’ve moved all my health care back here, because KU is taking such good care of me. They’re a special part of my life.”
He said he appreciates the support from KU fans at tour events.
“Everywhere I go around the. world, it doesn’t matter where I’ve played, I hear ‘Rock Chalk’ at least once,” Woodland said. “In the States I hear it a lot, but I’ve heard it in Australia. I’ve heard it in Japan, and everyone around me gives me a hard time. (They say), ‘Did all these people go to KU?’ I’m like, ‘I don’t know if they did or not, but they know I’m associated with this university.’ So it’s, it’s awesome to hear Rock Chalk. I’m assuming I’ll still hear it next week, even though we’re going to be Team USA. It’s an honor to represent the University of Kansas.”
KU men’s basketball coach Bill Self, who attended Friday’s ceremony along with KU golf coaches Jamie Bermel and Lindsay Kuhle, former KU volleyball coach Ray Bechard and many others from the athletic department, took to social media site X to congratulate Woodland on Friday night.
“Congrats to my friend and a great Jayhawk,” Self wrote on X.
This story was originally published September 19, 2025 at 8:05 PM.
