How Winthrop’s big bet on an unusual sport paid off with national championships
It all came down to the final toss.
Dusty Thompson could barely watch.
A former professional cornhole player, Thompson spent more than a year building Winthrop University’s fledgling cornhole program from the ground up. The coach handpicked every member on his team, enticing them with scholarships in hopes they would make a name for the new program.
All 10 of his athletes qualified for the American Cornhole League’s national collegiate championship in Myrtle Beach earlier this month. And in a nail-biting final match on Jan. 2, four of his players faced off against each other.
That’s not a bad problem to have for the team’s inaugural year.
“All the games leading up to that, I could cheer my team on, really hype them up, really get behind them,” Thompson said. “And then for them to play each other, you know, that’s what I wanted, but at the end of the day you don’t want to see either team lose, so you’re just peeking and not really watching.”
After just one year of recruiting top talent from high schools across the country, Winthrop’s investment is already paying off.
Virginia natives Josh Quinn and Luke Bryant won first place in the doubles competition over fellow Winthrop athletes Colson Clary and Jacob Harrison. Quinn and Bryant also won first place in a teams competition alongside Coloradan teammates Gavin Hamann and Jaxson Remmick.
In all, the Rock Hill university secured two first place wins, two second place wins and a third place finish. The champions say Winthrop offered them an opportunity they never thought possible.
“I never thought I’d go to college, number one,” Bryant said, “and I never thought I’d go for cornhole.”
Winthrop cornhole scholarships
Winthrop made national headlines last summer when the university became the first NCAA Division 1 school to offer cornhole scholarships.
Every team member came from outside of South Carolina but receives in-state tuition, Thompson said. That cuts their tuition costs nearly in half from about $28,000 to $14,000, according to the university.
Athletes said the team would look quite different if not for discounted tuition. So would their futures outside of the game.
“I don’t think there was any part of me that would’ve wanted to go,” said Remmick, who was planning to pursue trade school in his home state of Colorado. “I think that was kind of like, almost the deciding factor for me and my family.”
Quinn said he wouldn’t have attended college if not for the scholarship. The money swayed Hamann’s decision, too.
“Coming from a kid who’s had to work his whole life and pay for pretty much everything, it just spoke to me,” Hamann said. He and Remmick were both high school national champions when they became the team’s first recruits last February. “I mean, the opportunity to go to college, get an education, play a sport that you love and that you’re making money from while also getting a scholarship? Doesn’t really sound any better than that.”
Since cornhole isn’t an NCAA-sanctioned sport, students’ scholarships are tied to their academics rather than athletics. They must maintain a 3.0 cumulative GPA.
The American Cornhole League’s college championship awards additional scholarships to winners — meaning the Winthrop champions will soon receive even more money off of their education.
Winthrop cornhole sponsors
This year’s team had 10 athletes and a social media manager — all male freshmen Thompson recruited. The coach said Winthrop has not capped the number of scholarships he can offer prospective students, but he intends to pace himself.
“I wanted to make sure that if I brought them on, they weren’t just on a team,” Thompson said. “Next year I’m looking at more kids, but I’m not going to do myself crazy … I wanna keep it to where we can keep the number one team but also still have that family atmosphere to where kids wanna come here.”
Winthrop has already secured two female athletes for the fall, Thompson said. He’s talking to two other women who are considering a transfer, though he isn’t yet ready to release names.
Athletic Director Chuck Rey said the university sees cornhole as a natural way to attract students and increase enrollment considering the school’s proximity to the American Cornhole League’s headquarters about a half-mile away off White Street. That positions players to learn from some of the best players in the country.
BG Bags became the team’s first major donor this year when the company supplied free gear, which Thompson attributed as one factor that gave them an edge. A couple other sponsors helped pay for airfare and hotel stays during meets this season.
Thompson said he hopes to offer full-ride scholarships in the future, but that’s contingent upon more community partnerships and sponsorships.
“I can’t just get kids to come here if there’s not something in it for them,” Thompson said. “If things don’t continue to grow for these kids, you’re going to see other colleges step up and take the role that Winthrop’s doing. These kids don’t want to see that. They built this program, and they wanna stay on top.”
This story was originally published January 16, 2025 at 10:06 AM with the headline "How Winthrop’s big bet on an unusual sport paid off with national championships."
