By Ryan Herrington
It's fair to say that I've drunk the kool-aid regarding many nuances
of college golf, most notably how the team aspect of the sport plays such an important role overall. Yet if there's a specific part of the game I find myself unsettled about it is how I view the fall semester ... or more specifically how much import I put in it.
Indeed, I tend to side with coaches who espouse that the fall should actually be a time for experimentation (a group that finds itself in the minority). It makes sense to me to let as many players on a roster as you can get some playing time in live tournaments during the fall, in so much as it provides coaches the opportunity to see what kind of mettle said players have in honest-to-goodness competition. If that means taking "weaker" lineups to a tournament, so be it. My logic is that I believe any bad results in the fall can (likely) be improved upon in the spring, and having given your players the chance to sink or swim, you can better rationalize coaching decisions regarding playing time come the spring.
Part of this mindset comes from the fact that the top team at the end of the fall season frequently is NOT the school that walks off with the NCAA title come spring. Since
Golf World resumed its coaches' poll in the 2001-02 season, only two times has the No. 1 men's team in the last ranking before the winter break gone on to win the national championship come June—Clemson in 2002-03 and Texas in 2011-12. Eight of the nine other times the eventual NCAA champion was ranked in the top 25 (see chart below), but they had an average ranking of 8.625 (2002 champ Minnesota is the only winner that was unranked at the end of the fall). Granted this is a small sample size, but it seems to me you need to play decently in the fall, but playing exceptionally isn't a prerequisite for winning the NCAA title.
Similarly on the women's side, the top-ranked team closing the fall has only won the NCAA title twice: Duke in 2004-05 and 2005-06. That said in the other nine years, the national champion has always been ranked in the top 10 and only once has been ranked worse than 4. The general assumption is there's less parity in women's college golf. Still the idea that there's only a few dynasties running the show is a little outdated.
As we begin the winter break for the 2012-13 season, I think a few observations can be fairly made.
* There has been no more dominant team in the men's game than California, a squad that deservedly should be a favorite to win the NCAA title next spring.
* There is no guarantee, however, no matter how dominant Cal has looked, that they're going to win the NCAA title. In fact, history suggests it's actually unlikely.
* Considering
how wide open the women's title race appears to be, this might be the rare outlier season when a team
not near the top of the Golf World/WGCA ranking actually rallies in the spring and claims the title.
Meanwhile, the Syllabus will be taking some time off during the winter break. Just like the players themselves, the professor is looking for some R&R.
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* Campbell claimed its fifth team title last Sunday a 21-stroke triumph over Mississippi State at the JMU Eagle Invitational. It was the Camels fourth win in five starts, and the 69th overall for coach John Crooks, who is second among active coaches behind Duke's Dan Brooks in career wins. The team is three back of the school's record for most wins in a single season (set in 1997-98) with Crooks' squad having two more regular season events and the Big South Conference Championship (where they're the defending champs) still to play.
