Indiana native’s career includes eight years as an assistant at Augusta National

Lawrence, Kan. (Sept. 29, 2026) – Mitchell Eickhoff, the GCSAA Class A superintendent at Otter Creek Golf Course in Columbus, Ind., is the winner of the 2027 Emerging Leader Award from the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America (GCSAA).

The Emerging Leader Award, presented in partnership with John Deere, “recognizes an individual who serves the industry as a superintendent with less than five years’ experience, student, associate member or assistant who displays continuous growth in service and leadership.”

Eickhoff, a 12-year GCSAA member, is a native Indianan who originally attended Purdue University to pursue a degree in chemical engineering. After three years of study there, he was introduced to the golf course management industry by another GCSAA member — Phil Fischer, who now serves as the GCSAA Class A senior grounds manager at Brickyard Crossing Golf Course in Indianapolis. At the time, Fischer was seeking summer help at Victoria National Golf Club in Newburg, Ind. 

“After I was introduced to the industry,” Eickhoff said, “it was just something I fell in love with.”

Eickhoff, who eventually earned a business degree from Purdue, decided he wanted to make golf course management his career, so he secured a turfgrass certificate from Rutgers University’s two-year program and landed an internship at storied Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Ga. He then served as an assistant at Augusta National from 2013-21 before Brent Downs — director of agronomy at Otter Creek GC and its sister course, Harrison Lake Country Club — called to offer Eickhoff Downs’ old job as superintendent at Otter Creek.

Eickhoff and the Otter Creek staff are in the midst of a massive renovation, that will tear down what was a 27-hole facility originally designed by Robert Trent Jones Sr. into a 43-hole facility, upgrading the original 18 plus two new par-3s: a 12-hole pitch and putt and a 13-hole executive course.

“I feel very blessed to be a part of this,” Eickhoff says. “Not everybody gets to be a part of a project this big.”

In January, Eickhoff will formally receive this award during the 2027 GCSAA Conference and Trade Show in New Orleans.

To learn more about Eickhoff and his award, read the October issue of GCSAA’s GCM.