It’s been 30 years since schools other than Power Five won the NCAA Division I Women’s Golf Championship. It was San Jose State University in 1992 and was Spartan’s third title in five years.
Only one junior high school can compete in this year’s championship, which is located at 6th place San Jose State University, one of the most popular golf teams.
“We’ve been this far,” said senior Natasha Andrea Woon. She asked, “Why can’t you go ahead and finish it?”
San Jose State University boasts an incredible 124-8-1 record this season. Spartans lost to just one team, Texas Tech at Mountainview University, this spring. Since February, they have won five titles, including the Mountain West Championship and NCAA’s Ann Arbor Regional, defeating top-ranked Stanford several times in the process.
Sparta coaches downplay the idea of competition between the two schools in the Bay Area and call it friendly.
“We see playing at Stanford University as making sure they’re doing it right,” said head coach Dana Dormann.
Spartan brings the Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Arizona with the same lineup of seven events: Lucia Lopez Ortega, Antonia Malate, Kajasa Alwefiel, Louisa Karl Bomb and Woon. This crew hasn’t finished out of the top two in tournaments since October.
The beginning of the 4-stroke play round begins on Friday. The field will be cut into the top 8 teams for match play. Since the format of the championship changed in 2015, San Jose State University has not yet qualified for match play.
Dorman (formerly Lofland) was part of the 1987 team and won the first NCAA title at San Jose State University. She became head coach in 2018 after playing for the LPGA for 10 years, winning twice, serving as an associate coach at her alma mater and working with her husband John for over 12 years.
The Spartan heritage is deeply rooted, with major champions Patty Sheehan, Juli Inkster and Pathurst graduates. During the 1991-92 campaign, San Jose State University won an astonishing 9 out of 10 starts. Then, in the following two years, we collected 7 titles.
When Dorman was in school, the players took their shagbags to the practice soccer field and hit the goalpost. Today’s Spartans grind 100,000 square feet of tees using Tifway Bermudagrass. The Spartan Golf Complex’s short gaming area has over 55,000 square feet of grass and over 17,000 square feet of bentgrass green.
“It’s like day and night,” Dorman said.
Hurst worked as Dorman’s assistant until he was appointed captain of the Solheim Cup in the United States. Kortnie Barrett joined the staff in January 2021. It was Dormann who actually brought Barrett into the game when he was 10 years old when he participated in the LPGA-USGA Girls Golf Program in Pleasanton, California, run by Dormann.
“She is the one who encouraged me to continue,” Barrett continued to pursue.
Barrett saw the talent of the team and wondered if it was a lack of self-confidence.
She started by planting dominating seeds in the fall. She said she would not only win, but by the age of 20. Last year it may not have been straightforward for a team that did not qualify as a citizen.
“We are careful about how we use it,” she said. “Don’t lose to other teams. If you’re doing the best, and if you’re doing the best, that’s what dominates the day.”
When I was on the beach in Monterey last fall, a question was asked: Where do you think this season will end?
“It wasn’t straightforward to say that at that point,” Barrett said. “
They wrote it down.
Barrett declared spring a “speech season” after Spartan advanced to the final round and finished second several times last fall.
The idea extended to practice. Win the drill and give a speech.
Barrett remembers seeing a player coaching at a previous school lose most of the meeting title because he was so worried about his winning speech in the last few holes.
Speech practice proved to be practical and uplifting.
“We found that the victory speech was really a thank-you speech,” Barrett said.
And when those speeches moved from the practice session to the tournament podium, San Jose coaches were grateful to see their players maintain a humble approach.
USC Justin Silverstein coach praises Dorman’s team discipline. A blue-collar way for them to do business according to the game plan planned by the coach. That’s what he sees from the outside.
“The team is better than anyone,” Silverstein said. “If they win next week … I wouldn’t be a little surprised.”
This year’s team has already set school records in most rounds above Par in one season. Oon is the only player in school history with an average score of less than 71 and is currently sitting at 70.63.
Oon received a bachelor’s degree in business administration in December last year and is currently enrolled in graduate school, aiming for a master’s degree in interdisciplinary research with an emphasis on data analysis. Since Spartan is in the midst of her final exam at Greyhawk, she has a 15-page dissertation that expires during the NCAA.
Oon will join the NCAA following a victory in the Mountain West Championship and the NCAA Regional. Hurst is the only state player to win the NCAA’s personal title.
Woon has entered this season as he is still a little mysterious after he went missing due to a left leg injury last year. She said she was the basis for her because the time away from her game was far ahead of her.
“I didn’t even know if a comeback would happen,” she said.
The comeback will deepen this year.
Spartan has runner-up at the NCAA for the third consecutive year in 1997 and has only qualified for the championship seven times since then.
Now they have become one of their favorites for the first time this century, and Oon is the finalist of the ANNIKA Awards, which is awarded annually to the National Player of the Year.
Sparta has rules: there is no formal practice on weekends. Barrett said he talks a lot about balance as a team. They are a voluntary group, and Dorman admits that she has changed her mindset a bit from her old-fashioned disciplinary action to a more collaborative and empowering approach.
Oon praised the coach for keeping the player healthy.
“You can always look at them on your first tee and see how proud they are and what we have done,” Oon said.
Barrett wants to look at the natural hierarchy that exists between Power 5 and the mid-major program and turn it over.
“We know the history of San Jose State University,” she said. “Why not now?”
