SDSU golf: New coach establishes ambitious plan

Casey VanDamme isn’t messing around.

The new South Dakota State University golf coach’s players do pushups between short-game shots at practice. During a media luncheon, he lobbied superiors for a wording change to his title. He’s developed and is making progress on an aggressive three-item wish list.

As expected, the former assistant from former No. 1-ranked Tennessee is bringing – in short order – a different perspective to a South Dakota State golf program not far removed from operating in a relatively low-key manner.

“I think it’s a balance,” VanDamme said. “This place – we have unbelievable boosters and our administration is unbelievable, so we’re just trying to put together a plan. When we have a plan for what we want, it happens here.”

The threefold plan is this: Find a way to fund an indoor-outdoor practice facility, establish an elite-level tournament and upgrade the operating budget.

Among the last improvements made by previous coach Jared Baszler, who led the program through the NCAA Division I reclassification process, was raising money for the creation of an indoor practice space – chipping and putting area plus simulator – in the bowels of Frost Arena. VanDamme wants to take that to another level by creating a larger, more dynamic venue. Why? Because inhospitable weather is the primary impediment to landing and developing next-tier talent, based on conversations he’s had.

That ties into the operating budget in the sense that better recruits and better players will yield greater results. At that point, adding video equipment for swing analysis or crafting a more elaborate schedule won’t be an issue.

This is where VanDamme claims to be making fast progress. While declining to get into specifics, he said he is close to finalizing the creation of an event for 2015-16 that will include many of the top 10 programs in Division I. Ideally, those schools subsequently would invite SDSU to some of its events, giving a rather sudden boost to its strength of schedule.

He has no interest in waiting for things to happen.

“Most golf recruits it takes two years to get anyway,” said VanDamme, who made a splash by hiring longtime former Northern Michigan golf and men’s basketball coach Dean Ellis as the program’s first full-time assistant. “To enact your vision, you can’t be in your fifth year saying, ‘This is our vision for the program.’ It’s too late.”

Obviously, it’s been a change for the SDSU players. None of the 18 was late additions; they’re all Baszler recruits. He took the program from being largely local and tryout-based to boasting players from five countries and being good enough to notch occasional individual and team titles in regular-season events.

But he didn’t have multiple former players make The Masters. And he didn’t demand pushups between practice shots to simulate physiological conditions the body experiences during high-stakes situations.

“It’s awesome because short game is a big part of golf, and it really helps when you’re on point with it,” said junior Sydney MacDonald, a second-team all-conference pick from Calgary, Alberta. “It definitely helped with our (first) tournament – all the practice we’ve been doing and trying different shots and really working on it.”

The holdovers don’t lack for work ethic, VanDamme said. That’s important, considering their new coach has gained a reputation for putting in long hours. SDSU sophomore Grant Smith said VanDamme is in the office before 8 a.m. and sends out emails in the early morning.

Smith wondered aloud whether the Michigan native sleeps. And this is only the fall season; the spring portion is where championships are decided.

“He has really high expectations for us,” Smith said. “I think he has the right vision to get us where we need to go.”

SUMMARY: Former University of Tennessee assistant Casey VanDamme has taken over the South Dakota State golf program, and isn’t wasting time implementing his vision.

NEXT: Jackrabbit Fall Invitational, Sept. 22-23 at Minnehaha Country Club.