May 28, 2008

By Jim Sumner
theACC.com

Wake Forest enters this week's NCAA men's golf championship as one of the favorites to win the title after winning its Regional. The Demon Deacons have been here before. Wake Forest has spent the last 60 years competing for national titles in the sport, finishing in the top 10 no less than 15 times, most recently a third-place finish in 2006.

Wake's greatest successes came during the tenure of Jesse Haddock. A native of tiny Winterville, N.C., Haddock didn't even own a set of golf clubs when he was tabbed to be Wake's head golf coach in 1961. Haddock may not have been much of a player but he had an ability to analyze a swing and was a prodigious recruiter, a pair of traits that enabled him to find and nurture talent.

Haddock also was a master psychologist. He says it's nothing fancy. "I was a proponent of positive reinforcement. Negative thoughts dilute positive thoughts. Why waste time telling someone what they can't do? Show them what they can do, explain why, show them how, and reinforce that. The swing is important, of course, but when a swing breaks down, it's usually a mental thing. So, it's just as important to be able to handle pressure, to learn and adapt. Know where you want to hit it and why. Then trust them and get out of the way."

Haddock captured his first ACC tournament title in 1963 but the program really hit its stride when Wake captured 10 consecutive ACC titles, from 1967-1976. Wake duplicated that success on the national stage, placing second in 1969 and 1970, third in 1968, fourth in 1971, fifth in 1967. But that national title proved elusive.

Was there a monkey on Haddock's back? He says not. "We had been so close. We had proved we were good enough to play with anybody. Sometimes you need a little luck, sometimes you just need to work a little harder, play a little better. But I never thought we had failed or gone as high as we could go."

Haddock had one of his best teams in 1974, a young but precocious bunch that included a quartet of future PGA players: Curtis Strange, Jay Haas, David Thore, and Bob Byman. The NCAA championships were held at the Carlton Oaks Country Club near San Diego. Defending champion Florida was the favorite but Haddock notes that his team had defeated the Gators earlier that season and "felt very relaxed, very comfortable" going into the four-day event.

Actually, Haddock considered tournaments like this to be five-day events, although only four rounds were scored. "The practice round was our hardest round," he recalls. "We wanted to learn the golf course so well that we understood all of our options once the tournament started."

Florida certainly lived up to its favorite status. Hancock and Koch paced the field early and the Gators led Wake Forest by four strokes after two rounds. Houston was 10 stokes behind Florida, New Mexico 13 back.

Wake closed the gap a bit on the third day, led by Strange's 65, which tied an NCAA Tournament record co-held by such notables as Hale Irwin (Colorado), Ben Crenshaw (Texas), and Tom Kite (Texas). Strange took over the individual lead at 210, two strokes ahead of Hancock, who shot a 73, and Koch. Wake's Haas was at 216. Still, Florida at 863 led Wake Forest at 868, with the rest of the field slipping out of contention.

Haddock says the final day is about "handling the pressure. You know it's going to be there. What are you going to do about it? You just try to hang in there and hold your own and wait for the others to fade."

Wake did better than just hang in there. They closed to within one stroke of Florida after nine holes. The two teams fought tooth-and-nail down the stretch. Koch and Hancock played superbly for Florida but Denny Sullivan and Andy Bean struggled at three and four, shooting a 76 and 79 respectively on the final round, opening the door for Haddock's squad.

Wake led by two with only two groups left on the course. But Haas had a three-putt bogey on 18 to cut the lead to one. Meanwhile, Strange, Koch, and Hancock were fighting for the individual title. Strange and Koch came to the 540-yard, par-five 18th with both the team and individual titles at stake. Koch hit a three-wood to the fringe on his second shot but Strange answered with a shot for the ages, a 250-yard, one-iron to within seven feet of the pin. Strange dropped the eagle putt to clinch both titles.

Wake ended at 1158, Florida at 1160, with Houston a distant third, at 1176. Strange won individual honors at 282, one stroke ahead of Koch and Hancock. Jay Haas tied for sixth at 289.

Haddock points out that Wake would not have won without solid performances from Thore and Byman. After all, Koch and Hancock were a combined five strokes ahead of Strange and Haas but Thore's 292 and Byman's 295 easily outpaced anyone else's three and four men; Wake's Bill Argabrite shot a non-scoring 296.

"That's the great thing about college golf," Haddock says. "You need talent at the top but you also need depth. We always treated golf at Wake as a team sport and worked towards building teamwork. You've got to do more than just tell them, you've got to show them."

Wake returned its core players for 1975 and the result was a squad that many regard as the best college team to ever tee up. The Deacons lapped the field in the ACC Tournament, defeating second-place NC State by 36 strokes.

The 1975 NCAA championship was held in Columbus, Ohio, at Ohio State's Scarlet Course, which Haddock called "probably the best college course we ever played on."

It didn't take Wake long to impose its will on the field. Thunderstorms wreaked havoc with the opening day but nothing else slowed down the Deacons. Byman opened with a 70, one stroke behind leader Todd Crandall from Florida State. Strange and Haas shot 71s, Thore a 74. Wake led Oklahoma State by six, Florida by nine.

But Oklahoma State proved a tough nut to crack. After a superb second round, the Cowboys had halved their first-round deficit. Craig Carson of Ohio State led after two rounds with a 141, with Haas and Strange two stokes back. Byman was at 144 after a 74.

Wake stretched its lead back to six in the third round. Haas took over the individual lead with a 69, giving him a one-stroke lead over Carson and Oklahoma State's Tom Jones. Plagued by a shaky driver, Strange struggled to a 74, after which he characterized his round as "ugly. I played horribly, like an idiot."

Haddock was in the habit of meeting with his team in the hotel following a round to discuss what had just happened and what they needed to do the following day. He had to track down Strange. "Curtis was sensitive, intense and a perfectionist. He was under tremendous pressure to repeat and was brooding. But we talked and got him relaxed for the final round."

That final round was one for the ages. Strange made some birdies early, which Haddock says "took the pressure off his teammates." The relaxed Wake team blitzed the field. Wake's lead reached double figures and went from there. By the time the last shot had been fired, Wake had defeated Oklahoma State by a stunning 33 strokes.

Each of Wake's four scorers excelled in the final round. Haas shot a 70 and his testy, three-foot par put on 18 enabled him to hold off Alabama's Jerry Pate for the individual title at 282. Strange's 67 pushed him into third place at 284. Byman took fourth after a 73, Thore thirty-third after a 74. Tim Saylor posted a non-scoring 312.

Afterwards Haas summed up the dual titles by noting "the team spirit on this team is unbelievable. If you play for the team, the individual scores will come."

Wake had a legitimate chance to make it three in a row in 1976 but finished fourth; Oklahoma State won the team title. Haddock says, "Concentration was lacking. The fear factor wasn't there."

But Haddock identified a bigger concern. "My best teams were not teams dominated by seniors. Seniors are starting to think more about making a living at golf than finishing their season. There are distractions, calls at night, discussions with potential sponsors, equipment manufacturers, tournament hosts. Everybody means well but it's hard to coach a team in these circumstances."

Strange, Haas, Byman, and Thore all made that jump to the pros. Strange won 17 times on the tour, including the 1988 and 1989 United States Opens. Haas won nine PGA events and is still playing at a high level on the senior tour, as indicated by his victory last week in the Senior PGA championship, his second title in that event.

Wake won its third NCAA championship under Haddock's tutelage in 1986, in a dramatic final-round rally. Haddock's retired now and splits his time between Winston-Salem and the North Carolina mountains. He makes no attempt to downplay the talent of his 1975 team. "I think this may well have been the best college team ever. What distinguished it was its explosiveness. This team could just go on runs that no one else could match."

Jim Sumner's articles on southern sports history have appeared in the ACC Handbook, the ACC Area Sports Journal, Blue Devil Weekly, Inside Carolina, the Wolfpacker, Baseball America, Basketball America, and other publications. His latest book, Tales From the Duke Blue Devils Hardwood, was published in 2005. In his bimonthly column "Looking Back... by Jim Sumner", he will examine the rich history of the Atlantic Coast Conference.

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