Louisville Women's Golf -- Chapter 8 in Jared's History of UofL women's sports -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

A HISTORY OF LOUISVILLE WOMEN'S GOLF

Happy Friday and welcome to another session of A History of Louisville Women’s Sports. We hit the two-thirds mark as we hit Chapter 8. Today, we look at Women’s Golf. For the rest of the article we will refer to them simply as “Golf”.

When Tom Jurich was first hired as athletic director at UofL in October of 1997,, he soon added three teams. Golf was one of those. Kelley Meyers (later Rothberg) was tabbed the head coach. Their inaugural season was in 2000, where they finished second in Conference USA. Katherine Mowat also won an individual conference championship while Meyers was named Conference USA Coach of the Year. She would lead them to an NCAA Regional the very next year.

In the fall of 2002, Louisville hosted its first Cardinal Cup, a popular tournament still hosted today. They competed at a golf course in Simpsonville, KY, then owned by University Clubs of America.

It wasn’t until 2006 when golf won its first conference championship, claiming the Big East title down in Florida. Adrienne White also won the Cards’ first individual Big East title that year.

Courtney Trimble took over as head coach over the summer of 2012. She held that position through this
most recent, before stepping down to enjoy life. The Cards have several seasons where they were ranked in the Top 25 under Trimble and advanced to the NCAA Championships in the spring of 2018.

Whitney WadeYoung will take over as head coach for the start of next season. She has been an assistant with Louisville since 2017.

The University of Louisville Golf Club has been around longer than many think. It was originally constructed in 2001 by University Clubs of America and Palmer Golf Management operates the facilities.  It was bought by Champions Way LLC in 2003 and they owned the place for about a decade. UofL bought the property in early 2014 and re-branded the facility as the UofL Golf Club. Both the women’s and men’s teams have used the facility since it first opened but have been able to officially call it home since then. The course is open to members and other events when UofL is not using it.

Many excellent golfers have stepped foot on campus over the years. Meghan Little was one of the biggest names early on. Little won several titles early on and competed in the 2005 NCAA Tournament. Adrienne White was teammates with a little for a while and won a conference championship.

Cindy LaCrosse came in a couple years later and won a school record four tournaments in her career. She ended up with many other UofL records during her time. Sara-Maude Juneau and Laura Anderson are both in this decade and made headlines when they played internationally and combined to win four consecutive tournaments in 2009. Emily Haas came in just a few years ago and earned several Big East honors and owns the Cardinal Cup record at 209.

The 2019-20 squad features several golfers quite capable of shooting low scores. Returnees include Margot Bechadergue, Lauren Hartlage, Mairead Martin, Delaney Shah and Lauren Thibodeau. Their season takes place basically all year round and will start on Sept 9th in the Minnesota Invitational.

Hartlage recently qualified for her third straight appearance in the US Women's Amateur. The event takes place August 9-11 at the Old Waverly Golf Club in West Point, Mississippi. Thibodeau is listed as an alternate for the field of 156. 

We rarely get out to the UofL Golf Club to do live in-person coverage events like we do many other sports but the location is a beautiful one to visit. Make sure to head out to Simpsonville to see the Cards in action. Make a pit stop at the outlet mall to go shopping while out there. The adidas store usually has some affordable UofL gear in stock.

RADIO DAYS

Jared's Fan Club watching the show from across the street

You can catch the A-team on air for the second straight week tomorrow on The Cardinal Couple Radio Hour. .

The show starts at 11 a.m. Saturday and can be accessed many different ways.

www.wchqfm.com is the stations website and the show can be accessed there. It is also on Facebook Live. In the Louisville area, we're on FM at 100.9 and you can download the WCHQ app at the site and listen that way.


A bit of warning about our summer feature which you are welcome to participate in. A little bird is whispering in my ear that the Worldwide Cardinal Couple quiz MIGHT BE ABOUT MASCOTS.

Happy Friday and Go Cards

Jar-head