And the accolades keep on coming. UCLA women’s golf
coach Carrie Forsyth was voted the national Coach of the Year by
the National Golf Coaches Association on Monday afternoon. The
announcement came on the heels of Forsyth guiding her team to only
the second women’s golf championship in the program’s
history. The No. 2 UCLA women’s golf team walked away
victorious at the NCAA Championships this past Saturday in Opelika,
Ala. The Bruins, who led for the last three rounds of the event,
defeated No. 10 Oklahoma State by three shots. “I am
extremely grateful to the (NGCA) committee for this award,”
said Forsyth, who played on UCLA’s 1991 championship squad.
“This honor belongs as much to me as it does to my players
and staff. Everyone worked extremely hard to win this national
championship.” Forsyth, who is in her fifth season at the
helm of the women’s golf program, captained one of the most
successful seasons in Bruin history, though things didn’t
appear so promising after a disappointing fall exhibition season
during which neither the team nor an individual won a tournament.
But that stretch of golf was just that, an exhibition. Once the
spring season arrived, the squad kicked it into high gear, quickly
racing out of the gate with a double-digit victory in its first
tournament at Palos Verdes and never looking back.  The
team won six of its last seven tournaments and featured five
individual winners in that span. Junior Charlotte Mayorkas, ranked
as the No. 2 golfer in the country, won four individual
championships this year. Perhaps more telling of the impressiveness
of this year’s Bruin squad was its emphasis all year on
waiting to peak at the correct time. UCLA completed the rare
sweep of the Pac-10 conference championship, the NCAA West Regional
championship and the NCAA Championship. Under Forsyth’s
tutelage, every returning player on this year’s team had a
lower scoring average than the year before.
ALL-AMERICANS: Mayorkas and sophomore Susie
Mathews earned first-team All-America honors earlier this week.
Mathews and Mayorkas were UCLA’s top two finishers at the
NCAA Championships. Freshman Hannah Jun’s superb freshman
season was rewarded with the announcement that the San Diego native
earned second-team All-America honors. Jun is currently competing
in Arizona in a local qualifying tournament for the U.S.
Women’s Open. Krystal Shearer received honorable
mention.
SENIOR SENDOFF: The NCAA Championship did not
only represent the end of a tremendous season for the UCLA
women’s golf team; it also signified the end of the
collegiate careers of seniors Shearer and Gina Umeck. Both players
played a vital role in securing the championship for the Bruins and
were understandably emotional after their victory.
“Individually, I accomplished everything I wanted to
do,” Shearer said. “To come back (from injury) and win
it this year, this means more than anything else to me.”