It seemed odd that arguably the nation’s top women’s golf recruit of 2009 — and one from Hawaii, no less — was starting out her college career dressed more appropriately for a North Pole expedition than for playing a golf tournament.
Yet that’s how it was Monday for Kimberly Kim as she competed in her first official college round for the University of Denver. As Kim made the turn at Highlands Ranch Golf Club, snow was spitting from the gray sky, the temperature was hovering in the 40s, and mist was coming off the lake next to the 10th green.
Suffice it to say that it must have seemed like the dark side of the moon compared to the 80-degree weather back home in the Hawaiian Islands.
“That’s the coldest I’ve ever played in,” the 2006 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion said after her 2-over-par 74. “I didn’t know what to think. That wasn’t golf, that was survival.”
The weather was so off the charts that Kim was able to laugh about it, sometimes during the round, and certainly afterward.
“It kept me in a good mood,” she said. “I kept a positive attitude.”
While it was certainly a dreary day for the opening round of the Ron Moore Women’s Intercollegiate, it was anything but that for the DU women’s golf program, which has become a national powerhouse in the last couple of years, and only looks to be getting better. The Pioneers have finished sixth and fifth at the last two NCAA Championships, and were ranked fifth nationally in the coaches’ preseason poll.
DU lost a couple of stellar players to graduation — just Sunday, Dawn Shockley and Katie Kempter advanced to the final stage of the LPGA Tour qualifying process — but the Pioneers brought in a recruiting class that would be the envy of just about any program in the country.
Of the nine players on the Denver roster, four are freshmen. And regarding the two who have received the most attention, Kim and unrelated Canadian Sue Kim, another school’s loss turned out to be DU’s gain. The two Kims had verbally committed to play for Oklahoma State, but when Cowgirls coach Laura Matthews suddenly resigned last October, the two Kims reconsidered and signed letters of intent for DU.
The two freshmen showed what their capable of in their first round of college golf, each shooting 74 on Monday despite the lousy weather and sharing fifth place after the first round.
“We have started to recruit with anyone in the country,” DU head coach Sammie Chergo said. “With (associate head coach Lindsay Hulwick) and myself, we’ve built a reputation as a place where players can not only have some success, but have fun.”
Kimberly Kim is one of those players who came for those reasons and others. With her golf resume, she could have written her ticket to any college program in the nation. In winning the 2006 U.S. Women’s Amateur at age 14, she became the youngest champion in the history of that tournament. In addition, she’s finished runner-up in three USGA championships — the 2006 and 2009 U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links and the 2009 U.S. Girls’ Junior. It’s little wonder why, before turning 18 years old on Aug. 23, Kim was the No. 1 girls player in the American Junior Golf Association’s Polo rankings.
Asked why she chose to come to DU, Kim notes that she loves the school and the campus, and that the coaches “are awesome.” But there are a couple of other factors that played into DU’s hands. First, Kim said she “hates hot weather. I would never go to a school where there’s hot weather.” In addition, Kim’s older sister, Christine, is a senior on the University of Colorado golf team and resides less than 35 miles from DU’s campus. In fact, when Kimberly first came to Colorado three weeks ago, it was to Boulder. DU, which starts the season a little later than many of its counterparts, just began practicing last week.
“Kimberly is blending in well with the team,” Chergo said. “She’s played some Ultimate Frisbee with them.”
While Chergo, Hulwick and the upperclassmen are making it a point to ease the transition to college life for their incoming freshmen, there are clearly some high expectations for those players, particularly the Kims.
Earlier this month, Golf World magazine published a list of the top 10 “Female Players to Watch,” and two DU golfers were included. Stephanie Sherlock, the only DU senior this season, was ranked No. 6, having gained All-American status (second team or honorable mention) all three of her previous seasons, and finishing fifth and 11th individually at the NCAA Championships the last two years. And Golf World placed Kimberly Kim No. 10, and one of just two freshmen in the top 10 (along with Arizona State”˜s Jennifer Johnson).
“I’m hoping I can win some tournaments, but we’ll see how it goes,” said Kim, who gives herself a B-minus grade for a summer that included two second-place finishes in USGA championships.
DU’s promising team has Sherlock thinking big — as in possibly competing for a national title.
“We’ve got a real good team, so I’m excited,” she said. “This year we’ve got a better shot than we’ve ever had, so that’s a good goal. There’s no reason to shoot for top three or anything like that.”
Chergo, who has been the primary driving force behind the ascendance of the DU program, is likewise upbeat.
“We’re as excited this year as we have been any year,” she said. “We’re got four new freshmen — some athletic kids, which kind of fits the mold for us — so we’re looking forward to it. And with this being Stephanie’s senior year, we’ve put some talent around her.”
With just one senior and one junior, the Pioneers have the potential to be a national contender for the foreseeable future. Four of DU’s players are from outside the U.S. — Sherlock and Sue Kim are Canadians, junior Ellie Givens is English, and sophomore Sarah Faller is Irish. Sue Kim and Sherlock finished second and third, respectively, in the Canadian Women’s Amateur a couple of months ago.
Besides the Kims, DU’s other two freshmen are Tory Bauman from Wisconsin and Kelly Drack from Florida. Bauman was also a track and field and basketball athlete in high school, while Drack was a volleyball player.
All in all, “There’s a lot of competition” within the team, Chergo said. “We have eight kids competing for five spots, and we’ve never had that before.”
