Women’s Golf Blog: March Madness

The basketball championship games are underway, a time of year we refer to as “March Madness”.  Madness it is, as almost every day for the rest of March there will be a basketball game being played.  A time when it is not unusual for a team meant to win, gets beaten by a lower seed opponent.  A time when teams come together at just the right moment by staying in step with one another, each and every minute and sometimes one precious second.  The Nittany Lions experienced their first appearance in a decade and did not disappoint winning their opening game in convincing fashion and taking No. 2 Texas to the brink!   Coach Shrewsbury did not just wave a magical wand over his team to have them playing strong during this part of the season.  What we saw is something that had been cultivated over months of consistent effort, perseverance, learning, players open to the “coaching”, and finally “becoming” what they have been working toward day after day.  Yes, it is true, we become what we consistently do.

The women’s golf team started out the month of March with their own “March Madness” having two tournaments scheduled over spring break, playing a 36/18 hole format. Which basically means they played one hundred and eight competitive holes of golf in four days!!!  In between these two tournaments was a trip to the Players Championship to scope out how the pros get it done and a few days of friendly team competition.  

The women’s golf team has been working toward “becoming” a team of resilience, a team learning how to be a “team”, in a sport that seems to separate itself from the very word.  I would argue that it is more a team sport than even some sports that are on the field or court together.  Golf takes more effort to create the “team” atmosphere that can sometimes come naturally to others. If each player bogeys a hole that “err” is multiplied four times and before you know it your team is down the leaderboard in an instant.  Conversely, if all players make birdie at the same time, the team can easily run up the leaderboard.  This was the case at our recent tournament at the University of North Florida.  A “slow” first day left us at the bottom of the field 14th out of 16 teams.  The players were able to share some of their frustrations and emotional roadblocks that kept them feeling like their teammates were not…