If you remember just one thing I write in this space this semester, remember the name Mike Van Sickle.

Why? Because Van Sickle will be the most successful athlete to come out of Marquette since Dwyane Wade. I promise.

Think about it. He's a senior and the undisputed best golfer at Marquette. He's won 10 collegiate events and is the No. 9-ranked amateur golfer in the world according to the R&A, golf's governing body in Europe.

His 10-under total through Monday of the Palisades Collegiate Classic prove he's as close to a sure thing as Marquette athletics has to offer, and nobody knows it. If I asked you to pick him out of a four-person lineup I bet you'd pick him sixth, right after "Are you sure it's not No. 3?" and "All of the above."

Heck, I've worked for the sports desk of the Marquette Tribune for two and a half years, and never once talked to the guy.

But that changed last Thursday when I played 18 holes with Van Sickle and two other

members of the Marquette men's golf team — sophomore Kelly Kretz and junior Mike McDonald — at The Bog in Saukville, Wisc.

Remembering the advice my Grandpa Robinson gave me growing up — If you can't be a golfer, you can sure as hell look like one — I showed up to the course at 2:30 p.m. in my best golf attire (khaki pants and a blue-striped polo, no plaid).

The first hole at The Bog is a 530-yard par 5. The ideal aiming point is over a cluster of three bunkers off the right side of the fairway.

I took the safe route, hitting a pull hook well left of the bunkers but, thankfully, into the air. "He's a player," Van Sickle said, managing to sound only a little patronizing.

Van Sickle made birdie, I made bogey. I was already outclassed.

That first hole would be a microcosm of our round. Van Sickle sort of plodded along, having trouble with the slow greens. I sort of plodded along, having trouble with everything.

But I learned a lot about Van Sickle during that one round of golf.

For example, he's a big-time trash talker. Sure it's the nerdy trash talk of a golfer, but it's trash talk nonetheless. On the first green, while McDonald was standing over a birdie putt Van Sickle said "John, it'd be really great if you beat (Mike) today."

"Those two will go at it all day," Kretz said. They did.

He's also supremely confident, teetering on the edge of cockiness but staying well away from arrogance.

I asked Van Sickle who was the longest driver on the team, and he quickly answered "I am." This was despite the fact that Kretz, who treats a golf ball the way a hammer treats a nail, proved him wrong many times.

On the ninth hole, a 543-yard par 5, Van Sickle stood 250-plus yards from the green in the middle of the fairway and pulled out his driver. The ninth green is maybe 20-yards deep with a hazard in front and out of bounds stakes in back.

"If you hold the green with that, I'll buy the pizza (tonight)," McDonald said.

Van Sickle answered by ripping a bullet directly over the right side of the green that came thisclose to holding the putting surface.

Not perfect, but damn close. "That's the kind of stuff we see every day," McDonald said, shaking his head.

Van Sickle is committed too — he's been playing golf since he was two and a half years old. His first club was a modified persimmon 5-wood that his dad found broken in half in a golf course trash bin.

At the end of the round I posted a respectable 6-over 78, while Van Sickle had 72. He told me he plans to pursue the PGA Tour after graduation. I have no doubt we'll see a caddie with the name "Van Sickle" across his back in the future.

And that's why you need to remember the name.