A little over five years ago Cameron Hooper and his father decided to take a trip to St. Andrews, Scotland, the historic home of golf and a pilgrimage destination for patrons and players of the game. It was intended to be a present from father to son, a reward for years of playing well. But the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, put the Hoopers' trip on hold.

In September 2006 the two finally got the chance to make the trip when Hooper, a sophomore member of the Chanticleer men's golf team, traveled with four other members of this year's squad, plus coach Allen Terrell and seven of the team's boosters, to Scotland for the International Collegiate tournament. The three-round event was played on the Torrance Course at St. Andrews Bay and matched seven collegiate teams from the states against four Scottish teams.

"Scotland is where golf began," said Terrell. "To be able to experience the culture there and study the history of golf may be an opportunity these guys never experience again. It was that one time in college when the tournament was secondary," said Terrell. "It was about fellowship and learning."

Cameron Hooper and his father, Donald Hooper.

The Chants ended up finishing the event in third place, three shots behind champion North Carolina and one shot behind Wake Forest. The Chants' third round ten-under-par 278, fueled by junior Zack Byrd's 66, was a tournament-best. Texas Tech, Texas A&M, Baylor and Georgia Southern placed fourth through seventh, respectively.

Senior Dustin Johnson, consistently ranked near the top in the college world, won individual honors at the tournament after posting rounds of 70-68-70 on the par-72 layout. Hooper tied for seventh with a 211 total while junior Zach Byrd placed tenth and freshmen Sam Lyons and Josh Jackson also put together a few solid rounds to help the Chants to their third-place finish.

The lineup that Terrell took to Scotland included two freshmen but lacked Europeans Moises Cobo and Joachim Fourquet. "I wanted to take a group of guys that had never been there," said Terrell. Cobo, Fourquet and junior Lindsay Renolds had each traveled to golf's birthplace on multiple previous occasions.

Because of course conditions and harsher weather, the game is played differently in the United Kingdom. Players have to navigate their way around underneath the wind, which often means that they must run their balls into the greens rather than fly them to the hole.

Dustin Johnson said it took him a full day to get adjusted to playing conditions. "Over there you have to bounce everything," he said. "The ground is hard and there's no irrigation system. It was a great experience to see St. Andrews just to walk out on the course you get a sense of history."

For Zack Byrd, one of the highlights of the trip was dining at the St. Andrews Clubhouse, talking to some of the members and viewing the club's historical memorabilia. This event was arranged by Chip Smith, a Coastal alum who owns the Tournament Players Club in Myrtle Beach and is a member of St. Andrews. At the dinner the team met David Joy, who plays golf legend Old Tom Morris in the Titleist NXT golf ball commercials. Joy, a notable golf historian and writer, gave the team a history lesson.

"We saw some of the original golf clubs and feather balls that were used back in the early 1800s," said Byrd. "We saw Tom Morris' British Open scorecard from the 1860s. It was the coolest thing."

At the clubhouse: Team members learn about the history of the course at the clubhouse.

The Torrance Course was Hooper's favorite of the tracks that they played, mostly because he fared better on it, but also because of the views that it offered of the North Sea. "My mind was sort of taken off of the golf because the views that we had on the course were so nice," he said. "I was kind of in awe the whole time that I was there."

While Hooper preferred the tournament course, the team as a whole seemed to favor Kingsbarns-a modern links course a few miles southeast of St. Andrews. The team also teed it up at Carnoustie, site of six Open Championships and host to the 2007 tournament. Terrell teamed with Johnson in a friendly intra squad match the first day, and the two came away victorious. Team members still say their coach played the finest golf of his life that day. Terrell denies this, of course.

Of the five team members on the trip, Hooper was the only one lucky enough to get to play St. Andrews Old Course, one of the oldest courses in the world. According to course records, the game was first played there in 1574. And although he didn't get to play it with his father, the experience was obviously one of the highlights of the trip for Hooper.

"The caddies told great stories," he said. "At every hole, there was a great story from the history of the course. When you're in that presence, it's a really special feeling."