Nov. 22, 2005
The Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) Teaching and Club Professional (T&CP) membership has selected George Mason men's golf coach Linda Gaudi as Coach of the Year for the Northeast section. The LPGA T&CP annually selects winners from five sections--Central, Midwest, Northeast, Southeast and West. This is the second time she has been awarded Northeast Coach of the Year, the first time in 2000.
In 1980, the LPGA established the LPGA Coach of the Year Award. This award is presented annually to a woman golf professional who is actively engaged in the teaching and/or coaching of golf at the college, university or high school level.
The Jeannette, Pa. native has coached the Patriots men's golf team for the past seven years. Last season, the team participated in 10 tournaments and the Patriots best finish was second place at the Sea Trail Intercollegiate in September 2004. Mason never placed worse than 12th in a tournament, landing in the top 10 eight times and was ranked 14th out of 48 schools in the Mid-Atlantic Region in May 2005.
Top individual accolades from the Patriots golfers include Mike Cavanagh placing second out of 114 golfers at the Elon Sea Trail Intercollegiate and Mike Kirby finishing third at the Winthrop Waterford Invitational and eighth at the CAA Championship. This past summer, Kirby qualified for the National USGA Amateur and Nick DeSimone qualified for the National USGA Public Links.
Gaudi, a PGA and LPGA professional and member of the Golf Coaches Association of America, has been teaching golf for more than 19 years. She currently is the assistant golf professional at the Country Club of Fairfax, the home golf course of the Patriots, for the past 12 years. And, she is in her seventh season as a teaching professional at the Everybody Golf School.
A 1981 graduate of Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania with a bachelor's degree in business administration, Gaudi has worked at golf clubs throughout Pennsylvania, California and Virginia. She turned professional in 1984, and placed seventh in the LPGA Teaching Division Sectional Tournament in 1990.
