DETROIT >> The backdrop draping all around Detroit Golf Club this week is white, which contrasts well with the green of the grass.

Fitting, really, all the green and white.

At this week’s Rocket Classic, two Michigan State alums and one current player will tee it up, which is believed to be the first time three MSU players will tee it up in the same PGA Tour tournament. Ryan Brehm, James Piot and Ashton McCulloch are all in the 156-player field this week on sponsor’s exemptions, which isn’t a coincidence. Mark Hollis, former athletic director at MSU, has taken on an increased role at the Rocket, as a VP for Rock Ventures, Rocket Companies’ entertainment division.

“Three Spartans, three different pathways to the PGA Tour’s Rocket Classic, each with a story of perseverance, overcoming challenges, and reaching for the highest heights,” Hollis said Tuesday.

“As a Spartan myself, I am proud and honored to watch these guys compete at Detroit Golf Club.”

The three Spartans headline a heavy local contingent in this week’s field, including Detroit’s Joe Hooks (winner of the John Shippen Men’s Invitational), Brighton’s Otto Black and Grand Rapids’ Brett White (two of the four qualifiers Monday), and Caledonia’s Benny Cook (winner of the Michigan PGA).

Piot, who played on LIV Golf in 2022 and 2023 after winning the U.S. Amateur in 2021, is teeing it up on the PGA Tour for the first time since he played six events the year he won the Amateur. He served a one-year sit-out from PGA Tour qualifying in 2024 for playing on LIV Golf, and was about to tee it up Monday to try to qualify when he got the call from Hollis that he was being given a sponsor’s exemption.

Piot played a practice round Tuesday, alongside McCulloch, a current MSU player, on the front nine, and Brehm, a longtime PGA Tour player who played at MSU, on the back nine.

“I mean, it’s a phenomenal feeling. Obviously, I’m super blessed to be here,” Piot said just off the 11th green, while waiting for the fairway to clear on 12. “Thanks to, you know, Michigan State for getting me here. Mark Hollis, (MSU head coach) Casey Lubahn and those guys all pushing to get me in this event.

“It’s really showing Spartan pride in the community we have built here.”

McCulloch was a freshman at Michigan State when Piot was a senior.

McCulloch’s very first day on campus in East Lansing actually was the same day Piot won the U.S. Amateur at Oakmont (Pennsylvania) Country Club, on Aug. 15, 2021.

“It’s really cool just to reconnect,” said Piot, “and, you know, get back to my Sparty roots.”

Piot, 26, a Canton native, has played in one Korn Ferry Tour tournament this year, but hasn’t played a PGA Tour event since the 2021 U.S. Open. In June 2022, he left for LIV Golf, earning at least $6 million, including a significant signing bonus, in his two years on the rival tour.

For McCulloch, 22, a Canada native, this is his fourth PGA Tour tournament, awarded the exemption in a surprise ceremony at graduation on campus last month.

It was even a bigger surprise because he had been out for months after breaking a bone in his left hand, which is the dominant hand for a right-handed golfer. He only starting swinging the club a couple of months back, and he got a tuneup for this week in the Canadian Open earlier this month, when he missed the cut by a stroke.

Lubahn said McCulloch is playing at about “90%.” Fortunately for McCulloch, he grew up playing hockey, so he often took winters off from golf. He’s not unaccustomed to a break from the game, even if this one wasn’t weather-related.

“It kind of feels like you can ride a bike again,” McCulloch, the 2023 Canadian Amateur champion and one of three amateurs in the Rocket Classic field, said recently. “It’s pretty easy to pick back up.”

Not there’s anything easy about golf, as Brehm can certainly attest. He has been a grinder on the PGA Tour and Korn Ferry Tour for a long time, and this year, the status from winning the 2022 Puerto Rico Open has run out after he finished 158th in FedEx Cup points last season.

So this week marks just the third PGA Tour tournament this season for Brehm, 39, who is playing in his sixth Rocket.

As Max Homa has famously said, and as Brehm remembers, you’re often just one shot away from greatness in golf, and Brehm hopes this is a week where he can break back through — in front of his family and friends, and his fellow Spartans, both on the course and in the gallery.

“It’s always nice to see Michigan State represented,” said Brehm, whose caddie this week is ex-MSU golfer and assistant coach Dan Ellis, who was Piot’s caddie on LIV Golf. (Piot’s caddie this week is veteran looper/Florida ice-cream shop owner Ray Enzenbacher, who recently caddied for Bloomfield Hills’ Grant Haefner at the U.S. Open.)

“I know there’s a lot of Spartan golf fans that’ll be out here, and everybody’s excited about it.”

For Piot and McCulloch, it’s a chance to jump start their professional golf careers.

For Brehm, a Mount Pleasant native and Traverse City resident (he spent last week home and on his boat) who calls himself the “old guy” of this week’s MSU threesome, it’s a chance to get back what he had.

“It’s an opportunity to play for a lot of money,” said Brehm, who’s played four Korn Ferry Tour tournaments this season, missing four cuts with a best finish of tied for 56th, “and a lot on the line.

“Put together four solid rounds, you’re going to be rewarded. It’s just a very difficult thing to do.”

Speaking of difficult, the week just got a whole lot busier for Lubahn, Michigan State men’s golf’s head coach since 2011. He was planning on spending much of the week with McCulloch, his current player, after he got that exemption.

But to have three Spartans, well, that makes him busier at the Rocket, but that’s not a bad thing at all.

Lubahn, wearing a white MSU polo with Sparty swinging a golf club, said he’ll be out at DGC early in the week, before he heads overseas on a recruiting trip — in the hopes of finding the next Spartan stars who’ll tee it up on the biggest stage in professional golf.

“I’m just going to be there and wait for them to ask questions,” Lubahn said, shortly before the nine holes with Piot and Brehm got interrupted by a severe storm while the group was on the 13th green Tuesday afternoon. “It’s certainly a thing we’ve learned in coaching, if I come in and tell you something that I think is wrong, that hurts your confidence. If you come to me and ask me, then whatever I give you is adding confidence. That’s kind of what this week will be like.

“It’s one of the great weeks of my career,” Lubahn said between mini-lessons with Brehm, on his driving and chipping. “And more importantly, three of the greatest human beings I’ve ever known in my life. I’m very proud.

Brehm tees off at 12:32 p.m. Thursday and 7:07 a.m. Friday, Piot tees off at 2 p.m. Thursday and 8:35 a.m. Friday, and McCulloch tees off at 2:22 p.m. Thursday and 8:57 a.m. Friday.