Apparently you can get a college scholarship to play cornhole

Perhaps you’ve played cornhole during a backyard BBQ, or at a tailgate before a college or pro football game.

There’s even a professional league that has aired on ESPN.

Now, it will be a collegiate sport.

High school seniors Jaxson Remmick and Gavin Hamann signed letters of intent to play cornhole at Winthrop University, a Division I school in North Carolina.

“I never thought this is where cornhole would take me,” Remmick said. “I’ve come a long way, and this is awesome.”

The duo are the first student athletes to ever sign with a school to play cornhole. They are two-time Cornhole League High School National champions and are so good, they are considered five-star prospects. According to The Washington Post, the scholarships they are getting from committing to play will cover half of their tuition.

“Two and a half years ago, I just started going to a bar with my parents and playing normal league nights,” Hamann told local news station KDVR. “I started getting good, and now I’m the first-ever 5-star Division I recruit.”

While being recruited, Winthrop coach Dusty Thompson saw the pair’s skills and decided that those are the two teens he can help build a powerhouse program with. According to Thompson, they have beaten 10 pros, and the world champions from the last two years. The team at Winthrop is still at the club level, as it is not sanctioned by the NCAA, but they participate in tournaments held by other organizations.

Cornhole has seen a rise in popularity in the last decade, from becoming a simple backyard game to play with friends, to a tournament on live television. In August of 2023, over 180,000 people tuned in to the American Cornhole League Single World Championships on ESPN.

“I’m shocked, I mean, as everybody is,” Hamann said to KUSA. “It’s crazy. It’s groundbreaking, it’s new, it’s making history.”