Her Shot Golf founder Bria Janelle brings a new swing to the game

While names like Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders automatically come up when talking about people who have impacted multiple sports, Her Shot Golf founder Bria Janelle deserves to be mentioned, too.

A former Georgia high school basketball standout, Janelle has been putting up numbers in the hosting arena for a decade. Introduced to many locally as the original on-court personality for Atlanta-based pro-am league AEBL, she has carved a space for herself and her voice in multiple sports. When college football season starts in August, she’s hitting the field as Notre Dame football’s in-stadium emcee. Then, right as the sports equinox arrives in the fall, she steps on NBA hardwood as the in-game host for Chicago Bulls home games and travels to Atlanta to host games for next-gen hoop league Overtime Elite. When those seasons end, she picks up her summer job as an in-game host for the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream and runs it back when the Fighting Irish start their next season.

To relax in her offseason, she does what most chronically busy professionals do: play golf.

“I started going to the Masters when I was 13 years old, and have been around the game ever since,” said Janelle. She was introduced to the game by her grandfather, Ron Townsend, who became the first African-American member of Augusta National Golf Club, the course where the prestigious tournament is hosted, in 1990. “But as I started to get older and rise professionally I started to realize golf was where a lot of people were getting business deals done.”

She also observed, “I didn’t see a lot of people who looked like me out there.”

In the summer of 2024, Janelle partnered with the Georgia PGA’s Reach Foundation to create Her Shot Golf to introduce more young girls to the “gentleman’s game.” As an extension of her Bria Janelle Foundation, the program teaches Atlanta-area girls ages 11-18 everything from holding different types of clubs to the nuances of networking on the green.

“We have an inclusion pillar and we were looking for a grassroots program to really dive into and wrap our arms around,” said Georgia PGA Executive Director Scott Geary about initiating the program after meeting Janelle through a mutual friend in the golf world. “We didn’t quite have that spelled out yet but when Bria shared her vision of what she wanted to do, the light bulb just clicked.”

Using a playbook they already had for their PGA Hope initiative that works with military veterans, Geary and Janelle set out to build a six-week program consisting of weekly two-hour sessions. The first session focuses on community building, with the following classes teaching the game. The final session acts as a graduation where the girls play some holes on the course to show what they’ve learned. While anyone is welcome to apply, there is a selection process based on a 250-word essay where applicants express why they want to be a part of the program.

“We get all kinds of answers from ‘my mom wants me to be here’ to ‘I saw my friends playing golf,’” said Janelle. “Reading these essays allows our team to go in and find the girl who sees the value of it.”

“Most golf teams that I’ve played on, there were not a lot of girls who look like me,” said Milan Waller, who was already playing for her high school team and other youth leagues in the state before joining Her Shot. “I wanted to be here to see girls my age and who look like me, who weren’t just interested in learning how to play golf, but also make deep connections.”

It’s no secret that African-Americans have a long-distance relationship with the game of golf. A list published by the African-American Golfer’s Digest suggests that there have only been 30 Black players on the PGA tour since its inception in 1916 and only seven Black women on the LPGA tour since it was founded in 1950. A 2022 Golf Digest article stated that less than one percent of current PGA members are African American, and under 10 percent are women. This dearth is often credited to years of segregation, preventing Black players from even setting foot on golf courses, which were and still are usually located in affluent, predominantly white neighborhoods. So, even while a 2025 study by the National Golf Foundation suggests that record numbers of female and Black golfers hit the green in 2024, the optics many see and remember still tell a different story.

“There’s typically a basketball court, baseball field or football field or recreation center within a 10 mile radius of where most Black people live, it’s not that with golf courses,” said Janelle. “So you have to go to affluent neighborhoods where golf is a thing.”

She added that the costs associated with golf are another barrier, with a starter set of golf clubs fetching between $200 and $1,000 and the average golf lesson being $150 an hour.

“Plus, it’s such an individual sport that can’t be taught by everyone. You have that uncle or cousin that can teach you how to shoot a basketball, throw a football or swing a baseball bat. But it’s such a technique and a skill to golf that not everybody knows, so we just don’t touch it.”

To remove the financial barrier, Her Shot is free, with participants only having to provide their own khaki shorts or skirts. With Georgia PGA Reach involved as an official partner, the girls have access to golf courses where they have met and learned from LPGA players like Mariah Stackhouse and Shasta Averyhardt. As an equipment sponsor, Good Sports donates essentials, including golf clubs, polo shirts, gloves, water bottles, sports bras, and other items to encourage the girls to stay physically active even when they aren’t playing. Morehouse University golf team coach Edgar Evans donated pairs of his company’s Ordered Steps Athletics golf cleats for the girls to wear during the program. This kind of generosity comes as no surprise. Golf is reportedly the highest charitable sport, raising up to $4 billion annually.

“Golf has really changed my life and given me connections that will last me a lifetime so these types of programs are important,” said Evans on why he donated shoes on Giving Tuesday last November, even as an independent shoe company. “I had some small sizes left over and I was going to wait until Black Friday to just liquidate them. But I wanted to do something meaningful and thought this was a great opportunity to give back to some underserved kids.”

As far as the agenda goes, each day starts with an icebreaker activity to warm the girls up to each other. The first hour is spent learning the mechanics of swinging and building their driving, chipping, and putting skills.

“We have to remember that many of them haven’t been exposed to golf,” said Janelle, pointing to the patience it takes to run the program. “When we say things like ‘meet me on the putting green,’ they don’t know what that is.”

“It’s a lot that goes into golf that I did not know happened,” said Morgan Harris, who participated in the inaugural Her Shot and admitted getting introduced to golf terminology was like learning a foreign language. “I just thought you get to ride golf carts and then go hit some golf balls. I didn’t know that people did tournaments or spent six or seven hours just playing golf, every day. I was just like, I don’t understand how you guys do it.”

The second half of the day is spent learning the game to complement the girls learning the sport in the first hour.  It has long been understood that golf courses are fertile ground for networking opportunities. So, in addition to providing workshops teaching personal branding and financial literacy, the girls get to meet and be exposed to women working in professions ranging from business to architecture. While shaking hands and closing deals between holes is more myth than fact, Her Shot emphasizes how golfing can help build relationships that may lead to professional opportunities and other benefits.

“What’s most important about what Bria is doing in comparison to other similar programs is that she is trying to create better women in general, it’s not just a golf clinic,” said Elizabeth Clarkson, Secretary for the Georgia PGA and a PGA pro who has taught lessons at Her Shot sessions. “Golf is a metaphor for life because it teaches you honesty, integrity and life skills, and she’s applying that through her program.”

After piloting the program last summer, Her Shot returned for a spring round that started in March. Right before that, they hosted a satellite version of the program with college-aged students at Agnes Scott College, an all-women’s institution in Decatur, Georgia. With plans to bring back their summer offering, the Her Shot schedule is starting to get as full as Janelle’s.

“My mother raised me around volunteering and giving back so this kind of work is just something that’s been instilled in me,” said Janelle, who in addition to golfing, is a former high school basketball champion who holds the unique distinction of being a McDonald’s All-American nominee, as well as a two-time host of the game. “I’ve been able to merge the best of all of my worlds together.”