Sixteen-year-old artist Izzy Bogie knew nothing about golf and even less about young PGA Tour star Matthew Wolff until she searched online and discovered he hails from an otherworldly town oceanside in Florida.
"I had to look him up," she said with a bit of awe in her voice. "He's from Jupiter."
Bogie and Wolff met for the first time Tuesday in the 3M Open's corporate village, where Wolff presented her a backyard art studio for which her house-hunting parents now must find a home.
She in turn gave Wolff some stickers from a sketching she did of his dog Zeus.
She's a Masonic Children's Hospital oncology patient from St. Paul who has undergone chemotherapy and leg surgery the past three years. He's the 2019 3M Open champion who has been forthright recently about mental health, in particular his search to improve his own.
A young pro golfer and a teenager with a surname (Bogie) distinctly not made for the game were brought together Tuesday by their mutual love of dogs.
Her 3-year-old Corgi given her by a surgical nurse and named Happi has inspired her "HappiDraws" Etsy shop that offers cute, custom stickers featuring dogs of all shapes and sizes. Her father, Terry, calls drawing Izzy's therapy that helps her cope with her treatments' intensity and her diagnosis' significance.
Wolff's adopted Great Pyrenees/golden retriever mix makes bad days at the golf course better and good days even better.
He called "pretty spot on" the resemblance between Izzy's image of Zeus and his own rescued dog.
"When I saw it, I knew it was my dog," he said. "She's really talented. No one her age deserves to go through what she has gone through. She's fighting hard. It's just really cool that someone going through that has the time to do things for other people."
Her father tried to keep the studio a secret, but his daughter forced it out of him.
"That's OK," she said. "I have memory issues and I forgot."
Both artist and golfer were surprised by the gifts they received Tuesday.
"I was confused, why is the sticker of my dog on the window?" Izzy said of the moment Wolff walked to the studio's front door and said, "It's just for you."
Even actor and tournament ambassador Josh Duhamel stopped by and poked his head inside a 12-by-10-foot structure outfitted with a sewing machine, work tables, stuffed animal Corgis, shelves and cheerfully colored fabric.
The studio is a collaboration between title sponsor 3M and myBackyardStudio — a Brooklyn Park company born from the COVID-19 pandemic — that benefits a patient from the tournament's pillar charity partner, the University of Minnesota Masonic Children's Hospital.
"They could have chosen anyone; for them to come to me means a lot," Wolff said. "I'm just a middle man. Just to be part of it is really something special. To be that good at something with everything she has gone through, it has been really hard. But she seems really happy and that's what is important."
When he left, Wolff took the drawing she had worked three days to finish.
Somebody mentioned to Wolff he should get a head cover made from Izzy's work.
"Oooohhh," he said. "I like that."
