There is a typical rebuilding period for any team after it loses its coach.
Normally such a departure can cripple a college team’s recruiting efforts and distract its players.
At a school like UCLA, the incoming coach faces championship expectations from day one. Needless to say, the transition is usually not an easy one.
The UCLA men’s golf team might be a rare exception.
The Bruins lost their coach, O.D. Vincent, to Duke in June. Derek Freeman, Vincent’s former assistant, was quickly tabbed as his replacement.
Freeman was an easy choice after players and recruits let the athletic department know that they wanted him to stay. The team hasn’t missed a beat since Freeman took over.
“Overall there’s pressure,” Freeman said. “There’s expectations to be great, and that’s why I’m here.”
UCLA enters the 2007-2008 season as the No. 2-ranked team in the country, behind defending national champion Stanford. The Bruins’ top player from last year, Daniel Im, turned pro. But the team returns two second-team All-Americans, senior Kevin Chappell and junior Lucas Lee, and adds freshman Philip Francis, the 2006 U.S. Junior Amateur Champion.
The Bruins are certainly aiming higher than their seventh place finish at last year’s NCAA championship.
“During my time at UCLA we’ve never really felt like we were in it at nationals,” Chappell said. “This year that’s our goal, to put ourselves in that position.
“It’s definitely the best team I’ve been on at UCLA.”
The season starts on Oct. 21 at the Big Ten Pac-10 Challenge, hosted by Northwestern University. The tournament will be an opportunity for the Bruins to face top competition and a chance for Freeman to test every player on his roster. But the four tournaments UCLA will play in the fall are mainly preparation for the intense spring season.
“We want to win in the fall,” Freeman said. “But the fall is also a time to work on things. These guys have played all spring and summer, and sometimes they’re tired. We want to get back to fundamentals, and take care of any weaknesses before the spring season because that’s what matters.”
Freeman will certainly push his team in order to find the five-man squad that can compete at the national level. The depth of the UCLA roster has always made it a challenge for coaches to find the right lineup.
Even Francis, who comes in as the top-ranked recruit in the nation, will have to prove that he deserves a spot on the traveling roster.
“I would love for (Francis) to be the best player in the country,” Freeman said. “But he has to earn everything just like everybody else does. Every day is a competition.”
The Bruins have already warmed up to Freeman’s style. Chappell cited Freeman’s knowledge of the game as an asset.
“I’m focusing on course management and trying to open my eyes to new ways to play,” Chappell said. “That’s one of coach Freeman’s specialties. When he played he had to be the smartest player out there. He has already taught me that you have to be smarter than the next guy.”
Freeman is anxious to get to work. He said the players’ success over the summer in individual competitions was not what he had hoped for, outside of Lee’s brilliant performance at the Western Amateur.
“We didn’t have a very good summer overall,” Freeman said. “None of our guys played great; they played OK. It’s part of my job to make sure that we’re all improving.
“These guys are good enough to be challenging and winning all these tournaments, they just didn’t do it.”
The task for this team is not an easy one; UCLA hasn’t won a national championship since 1988. The Bruins have the individual talent to compete with any team in the country, but to win a title, they’ll have to be dominant as a team.
“We play an individual sport,” Freeman said. “(But) my philosophy is that we’re a team. We win and we lose as a team, not as individuals … (The players) understand that for them to reach their personal goals, they need a good team.”