Slow-walking people frustrate her – both on and off the golf course – yet her temper is at its most frayed in a different sporting arena.

“On the tennis court, I have such a temper. It’s next level, honestly. Even Dad’s like, ‘Wow, Cass, chill.’ And I’m like, ‘No! I am better than this.’ It really gets on my nerves.”

Yes, LPGA-bound Cassie Porter is the cheery, effervescent person you have seen emerge on the WPGA Tour of Australasia and the Epson Tour the past three years, but there is so much more sitting just beneath the surface.

“There’s definitely a real fire there that burns pretty bright all the time,” Porter confesses.

“I want to be the best. I don’t want that to sound bad, but it’s just a mindset thing.”

“It doesn’t matter what she does, she absolutely has to win,” says Porter’s long-time coach, Dan Morrison.

“I’ll play her at darts, no problems at all. I’ll play her at darts any day of the week. But tennis, no, she’s too good.”

With an LPGA Tour rookie season beckoning, Porter begins her 2025 campaign as one of the marquee names at this week’s Webex Players Series Perth hosted by Minjee and Min Woo Lee at Royal Fremantle Golf Club.

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It is somewhat new territory for the 22-year-old but the next stop along a path she, Morrison and her family have been plotting for close to a decade.

“Six months to a year in, I had almost a hundred percent faith that I knew where we could go with this,” said Morrison, who first started working with Porter when she was just 14 years old.

“I knew she could make LPGA. It’s one of those things that was blindingly obvious.”

‘I woke up one day and couldn’t walk’

Early in 2020, shortly after coming through the stress of completing her final year of high school, everything that an athletic and energetic Cassie Porter had known came to a frightening halt.

At her parents’ home on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, Porter woke to searing pain in her hip and back, an ailment that she would undergo 16 MRIs in an attempt to diagnose, a range of diagnoses from different specialists failing to find the solution.

It was an 18-month enforced hiatus from the game at a crucial time in a young player’s development, Porter faced with the possibility that she may never play competitive golf again.

“Every doctor I saw told me something different and I was just getting worse. I was in so much pain,” Porter recalls.

“Certain people weren’t scared to tell me that I would never play golf again and that my career’s probably over.

“I just was like, That’s just not it. That’s not where my journey ends.

“I changed my physio and saw a few doctors that I really wanted to see and within six weeks I was back playing pain-free.”

Working closely with Morrison and physiotherapist Jen McKenzie, Porter slowly and methodically rebuilt her body and her game.

When she returned to competitive golf after almost 18 months away, Porter won the Katherine Kirk Classic and Keperra Bowl in quick succession.

At just 19 years of age, she then made the decision to turn professional.

“My coach and I were basically the only ones in our whole circle that were like, ‘Let’s do it’,” Porter says of her move into the pro ranks.

“It was a pretty bold decision, I won’t lie. It did happen quite quickly. I mean, I didn’t play for 18 months. Suddenly I was playing pain-free and straight out the box, I wanted to turn pro.

“I was house-sitting for my sister at the time. I went down to the beach and just cried for four hours. I knew that if I turned professional then… there’s no going back after that.

“It was that cliff that once you take that step, if you have the right mindset, you’re not going to fall. You’re going to fly.”

‘Potential to be a superstar’

Cassie Porter was 12 years old when she first told people closest to her that she wanted to play the LPGA Tour.

Ten years on – and eight years into the plan she and Morrison devised with the United States as the ultimate destination – that pre-teen declaration has become a reality.

A win at the FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship last June gave Porter the foundation to finish 10th on the Epson Tour points list and secure that coveted LPGA Tour card.

Playing in Perth this week is partly driven by her goal to be top 80 in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings by year’s end as she and Morrison plot what comes next.

“Yes, we’ve ticked off a very long journey to get to this point, but it’s the beginning of the main story now,” says Morrison.

“We need to keep putting that work in and be able to justify the work we’ve done and get a reward for the path we’ve travelled.

“We just want to make sure that we do ourselves proud and get those results that we know she’s capable of.”

Adds Porter: “I’m absolutely going to be grateful for every second because it’s what I’ve dreamed of since I was 12.

“It’s a dream come true, but I am also not going to take that for granted. I’m going to work hard because there’s a lot of stuff that I want to achieve out there.”

From the emergence of Karrie Webb through to the current crop of major winners in Minjee Lee and Hannah Green, no one has witnessed the emergence of more Aussie talent than WPGA Tour of Australasia CEO, Karen Lunn.

Having known Porter since she was 15 years old, Lunn believes Australia’s latest addition to the LPGA Tour has the foundation to join the greats of the game.

“You can get there too early, there’s no doubt about that, and the stars have got to align for you to reach the pinnacle,” Lunn adds.

“The Epson Tour has been the best thing for her. She’s absolutely ready to go to the LPGA now, where maybe a year ago she wasn’t.

“If Cassie stays healthy and if she keeps enjoying it, I have no doubt she can get to the very top of the tree.

“She’s got the potential to be another superstar.”