Oregon daily emerald., May 24, 2000, Page 12, Image 12

National Residence
Hall Honorary
Congratulations to this weeks Outstanding Staff Members.
Dynee Putnam Josh Christiansen Greg Miller
Carmen Steuwe Jessica Lane
If you know someone in the Residence Community who should be recognized
E-mail ckwalker@hotmaii.com
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Kevin Calame Emerald
Baumgartner (left) was Pac-10 Coach of the Year in 1997 and has led the Ducks to four NCAA Championship appearances.
Golf coach
continued from page 11
was asked to take the reigns in the
team’s second season.
Since then, Baumgartner has
spent 11 years as head coach at
Oregon and two years leading her
alma mater, Southern California.
In that time she has made five trips
to the NCAA Championships,
won Pacific-10 Conference Coach
of the Year honors in 1997 and had
two babies to boot.
Now, the coach will become the
administrator. Baumgartner takes
over duties as Associate Athletic Di
rector full-time next year and will
leave her coaching career behind.
“I’m looking forward to the next
chapter in my life being an admin
istrator,” Baumgartner said. “But I
will always have that ounce of
coach in me because of my person
ality.”
That personality is one that
drives her team but keeps them
loose and having fun.
“She’s just awesome with the
whole team,” said senior co-cap
tain Kylie Wilson.
“She’s a really good people per
son,” Wilson’s co-captain, senior
Pam Sowden said.
All of Baumgartner’s coaching
experience, she hopes, will trans
late into a successful end to this
chapter in her life.
The Ducks have a few factors
working for them in Sunriver. For
one, they have a few players on
hot streaks. Junior Jerilyn White
has been playing well enough to
earn a No. 77 national ranking.
And senior Anika Heuser has been
matching White almost stroke for
stroke recently.
Second, the Ducks have played
the Crosswater Golf Course before
— with success.
In September, Oregon placed
seventh at the NCAA Fall Preview
at Crosswater. That tournament
featured the top 21 teams in the
country.
Finally, there is the emotion fac
tor. Oregon has to be the only team
playing in the Championships
that has four graduating seniors, a
talented junior and a coach with
nothing to lose.
“I call [this team] my ‘dream
team,”’ Baumgartner says. “It is
the best team I’ve had, and I think
it will show this week at Crosswa
ter.”
Although she doesn’t like to talk
about it, there is a footnote to this
coaching chapter in Baumgart
ner’s life, a trip she took back to
USC after coaching at Oregon for
six years.
In the two years she spent at
USC, she led the elite program to a
second place finish in the NCAA
Championships in 1994, but she
found herself missing the land of
rain and green trees.
“My blood’s gold and green,”
Baumgartner says. “You don’t re
ally, truly appreciate something
until you don’t have it anymore. I
really belong at Oregon.”
Most golf coaches would have
held on for dear life to a program
like USC, which had 10 All-Ameri
cans in the last 20 years. In six years
at USC as a player and coach,
Baumgartner finished second, third
and fourth in the Championships.
As a coach at Oregon, she has fin
ished better than 10th once—a sev
enth place finish in 1997.
Instead of riches and prestige,
Baumgartner chose to build a pro
gram from scratch, a program that
could reap the benefits further
down the road.
“We’ve earned the reputation to
be one of the top 20 teams in the
country year-in and year-out,”
Baumgartner says. “I’m proud of
that.”
So, as the last page of this chap
ter is written, Baumgartner hopes
her book will turn out like a Hardy
Boys novel — all good in the end.
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