Sweetens Cove Golf Club

Few courses anywhere have generated the kind of cult following that Sweetens Cove has earned since opening in 2014. Designed by King-Collins Golf Design (Rob Collins and Tad King), this 9-hole layout in the Tennessee Valley has become one of the most talked-about new courses in American golf — ranking regularly among the top courses in the country despite its brevity and accessibility. It is a daily-fee course that plays as a single loop but offers multiple tee combinations to create varied 18-hole experiences, rewarding repeat visits with a genuinely different game each time.

The design draws deep inspiration from the golden age of golf architecture, with wide, rumpled fairways, dramatic contours, massive and wildly imaginative greens, and a sensibility that prizes creativity over brute length. The land was a reclaimed sod farm, and Collins and King transformed it into something that feels both timeless and wholly original.

South Pittsburg sits in Marion County at the foot of Raccoon Mountain, near the Tennessee River Gorge — rugged, scenic Appalachian foothills country. The setting is unpretentious, which suits Sweetens Cove perfectly. The course has no pretension, just genuinely great golf.