Q & A with Melissa Luellen, Head Coach of the Women's Golf Program at Auburn University

Written by Sabrina Xiaorui Wu

Headshot of Coach Melissa Luellen. (Photo courtesy of Melissa Luellen)

Whether it was winning championship titles and earning recognition as the 1983 AJGA Player of the Year during her high school and collegiate career, or qualifying for the LPGA Tour after graduation, golf has always been a prominent part of Coach Melissa Luellen's life. After leaving the LPGA, she transitioned to coaching collegiate golf, first at her alma mater at Tulsa University, then at Arizona State University, before arriving at Auburn University. There, Coach Luellen helped rebuild a struggling program into one of the country’s most successful women’s collegiate golf teams. At all three schools, Coach Luellen has consistently led her teams to claim tournament and championship titles, and her players have received countless honors, such as being recognized as Pac-12 Golfers of the Year and being named to the SEC All-Freshman team. In the process, Coach Luellen has also become a highly decorated coach. Among her numerous accolades, she was named in 2009 as the SkyCaddie NGCA National Coach of the Year, was inducted into the University of Tulsa Athletic Hall of Fame in 2000, and was inducted into the WGCA (Women's Golf Coaches Association) Coaches Hall of Fame in 2014. I had the privilege of speaking with Coach Luellen regarding her personal journey as a professional golfer and collegiate coach along with her perspective on the experiences of women golfers.

WU: I understand that you started playing golf from an early age, so I was wondering what about this sport first attracted you? And what inspired you to continue to pursue this sport in college and later turn it into your career?

LUELLEN: Both my parents were golfers, very good golfers, and I think when I was young, just getting to ride in the golf cart was my main interest. That's what I loved to do. And then as I got older, I got a little bit bored with that, and my parents would bring some clubs out and let me hit some shots, my sister and I both. It was just something that we did for fun as a family, and then we were in little junior camps and stuff. We had summer camp, and we did swimming and tennis and golf, and I just kind of kept gravitating toward golf and then my mom became a college golf coach at Tulsa. So now all these college golfers were around in our house and I think that's definitely what piqued my interest and decided that, hey, I want to play college golf. And then Nancy Lopez was on my mom's team the second year of her coaching and there was just something about her. People gravitate to her. She had such great charisma and kind of took me under her wing a little bit. I think that those people, those college girls, inspired me to want to play golf at a high level.

WU: In high school, I know that you often played on the boys’ team, so for you, what did you enjoy the most from this experience and what did you find most difficult?

LUELLEN: Most of them accepted me because I think they respected that I could play at a pretty good level. I had to play from the longer tees, and I was never really a long hitter. So it was really great for my short game. I just remember there was one kind of confrontation I had with a boy about rules and I knew the rule and he didn't, and he was one that just couldn't accept that I could beat him. I always kind of just laughed and giggled about it. It was a great competition for me, and any time you get great competition, I just love it. So I think playing from the longer tees was my biggest challenge, and just trying to score from par fours that I really couldn't reach at the time.

WU: You had the unique opportunity to have your mom as your coach in college, so did working with her inspire you in any way to become a coach yourself?

LUELLEN: I would probably say no, because I was so locked in on what I was doing with my golf at the time and she coached for 26 years -- ironically, I'm in my 26th year of coaching -- and I was playing on the LPGA and realized that it was time for me to get off the road, to be done playing competitive golf. I had my degree in marketing, and I thought I would go into pharmaceutical sales or something like that. I was 34 years old and, like, what am I going to do? All I had done was play competitive golf. My mom was still coaching, and she said, “I think you’d be a great coach.” I'm like, oh gosh, I honestly didn't even think about it. And I said, “well, maybe I'll try.” So she invited me to be her volunteer assistant at the National Championship her last year, and I kind of got a taste of it. She let me coach all four days. Her team was ranked like number three in the country and I was like, this is amazing. That was my entry into it, just coaching the national championship. I had a lot to learn about coaching and it's certainly way more than just the technical side. Anyway, I decided that I would apply for the job, and my mom retired, and I took her job as head coach at Tulsa, so I never was an assistant coach. I didn't have that learning curve. I never really studied it [coaching], never really thought about it. I just really kind of threw myself into it. And here I am, 26 years later, still learning.

WU: Wow, that's really impressive, because looking at your track record, no one would have ever thought that you didn't have any prior assistant coach experience.

LUELLEN: I wish I had, because I made a lot of mistakes early on with those teams that I inherited and I was just so unprepared. But, you know, I think sometimes just learning with the fire underneath your feet and you just got to figure it out. And then, with my mom being such a great coach, I had to really figure out what my philosophy was, what my style was. When I went into it, I just didn't have a clue what I was doing. I didn't know about culture and all that stuff. So I really had to kind of learn along the way, and I had a lot of great mentors other than my mom. I was a little too stubborn to ask for a lot of help from her. Looking back, I was not very smart by not asking her for more help.

WU: Looking back, with all the experience you now have, is there anything you would have done differently in your golfing career? Or is there any advice you would give your younger self regarding this sport? 

LUELLEN: Probably not. I mean, just by being inquisitive and having that drive to try to figure it out. There's no better teacher than experience. So someone can tell you what to do, what path to take. But for me, it always seemed like I had to experience it myself and maybe go against the grain a little bit or learn by making mistakes. You learn a lot more from your defeats than you do your victories and those early years were pretty tough. Would I change anything? Probably. I would ask my mom more questions.

WU: Given the previous difficult circumstances surrounding the women’s golf program at Auburn, when you first became the Head Coach here, how did you think this program was going to work out? And then did the reality align with your expectations? 

LUELLEN: The program was kind of broken. Coach Evans was just a legendary coach and still lives here in Auburn, thankfully. She had stage four Ovarian cancer, and when you're recruiting, you're always out there, you're always looking. You have to have a lot of energy to do this job, and people, you know, prospects were wondering, was she going to keep coaching? Was she going to retire? Was she going to die? I mean, it was a really difficult time for the program and it was a tough time for the assistant coach because nobody knew if he would stay on. A lot of speculation, so the recruiting was pretty tough for a couple years there and it doesn't take long to drop if you don't have good recruits come in. I came from an amazing program. I was lucky enough to lead the Arizona State Sun Devils, and had a really strong team and had worked to kind of build that program back after the coach had been injured and retired. But I was approaching 50, kind of that age where you’re like, what really matters to me? And just to be able to really focus on recruiting and coaching was something that I really, really liked, and I liked the challenge of coming in and rebuilding a program. I knew that Auburn was such an amazing atmosphere for a young lady to come and I just believed that when I came here, I felt it. I just believed that we could build a program back up again. A lot of people have helped along the way. The players that trusted in our vision and the assistant coaches and the community. It's a very special place, and I'm very proud of what all of us have built together.

WU: Based on your vast experiences, are there any common misconceptions people often have about coaching women’s golf?

LUELLEN: They think that we play golf all the time. They think that it's a really easy job. You just go to the golf course every day. A lot of people look at golf as recreation, whereas we're competing at the highest level and we're trying to win national championships and conference championships and we take it rather seriously. A lot of people ask me if this is a full time job. They ask if I have to teach at the university. A lot of people think that there's just unused scholarships in women's collegiate golf. I don't know where they get that, because I think it's pretty tough to get on a roster and get a scholarship. So yeah, I think there's a lot of misconceptions.

WU: What do you find most rewarding about working with female golfers?

LUELLEN: When I initially was a coach, I was all about winning tournaments, rankings, all the things. It didn't take me long to figure out these are young women that are relying on me to help them follow their dreams or figure out what they want in life. Nothing makes me more proud than when somebody graduates from our program, whichever school that I coached at, and they say good things about our young ladies. That they're good people, they’re respected, good students. Just good people. And that just really makes me proud of the young ladies. I feel like I just had a little touch on them and I don't know if I ever made a difference, but I know that they have all made a difference in me. They've all taught me probably more than I ever taught them.

WU: You have mentioned in other interviews that many of the qualities you have observed in players who make it to the next level include a strong work ethic, a belief in themselves, and mental toughness. But what are some lesser known traits that you have observed in successful female golfers which most people don’t usually think about?

LUELLEN: If someone is a homebody and just loves being at home, I think they're gonna really struggle with the lifestyle of being on tour because you're basically a nomad. You're gone a large portion of the time. Relationships are difficult. You have to have an unwavering belief in what got you to that point. It's very easy to get rabbit ears and start listening to what's so and so doing and start second guessing yourself. It's really easy to lose your confidence. So I think that knowing what makes you tick and what works for you, you have to be super strong about that and continue on and just keep working a little bit every day to get better and not try to find the magic solution because everyone is so vastly different. I think you just have to really use your college years to experiment a little bit, find out, and get really clear on what does work for you, and then just stick with it. That is the biggest advice that I give my players if they want to pursue professional golf.

WU: For anyone who may be lacking any of these traits, how would you recommend they best improve themselves? Are there any mental exercises or is it really just getting more experience?

LUELLEN: Well, we work with a mental coach. There's so much time between shots, the ball sits still and there's a lot that can go on in your head. Mastering is a word that our mental coach uses. It's like you want to master different things. If you can master the mental game and get yourself back to neutral as soon as possible then you can master the tour. It's the hardest thing, and it's something you really have to put time into. I think people all know it's important, but putting the right amount of time into it is pretty challenging. Golf is a high level skill game. 

We talk about the preshot and all the preparation and how it needs to be really a solid routine. Something that we're taking into these next two tournaments in front of us is just really working on our post shot routine. And I would say most players don't have a post shot routine. And it's like, what do you do when you hit a great shot? What do you do when you don't hit a great shot? And having a plan for that and kind of a couple of simple steps to be able to manage that. I always say learn or celebrate. If you don't hit a great shot, you've got to learn from it and then put the club away and go on to the next one. It's very easy to say and very hard to do. And when you hit a good shot, I think at this level, our players expect themselves to hit good shots, so they don't do anything emotionally when they hit a good shot. Like, you need to really give yourself credit, pat yourself on the back, and you're like, man, I can hit seven irons like nobody else, you know? Delusional statements to yourself that you really need to get in the habit of saying, and I just don't know that many players are very good at that. Something that we're definitely going to be working on this time of year is just really getting strong, being able to reset, getting back to that neutral as quickly as possible and celebrating the good shots and learning from the not so good ones. 

We're so quick to judge ourselves and over the period of a few holes or a few shots, the things that we say to ourselves, it's not very nice. That starts to chip away, and then your confidence starts to go down, you start going down this downward spiral, and it's like these chemical reactions are happening in your body. It actually takes sleep and recovery to get over them. So you don't really want to go down that downward spiral while you're playing, but you see a lot of miserable people on the golf course and my caddy used to tell me misery is optional.

WU: How would you like to be remembered as a golf coach? What lasting impact do you hope to leave on the Auburn University’s women's golf program?

LUELLEN: It's just that I'm proud of the young women that came through our program, that represented Auburn with class and dignity, and to learn to have grace with yourself and really have a lot of gratitude. I'm proud of all these young women, and it can be a rather bumpy road, like they all want to go in this straight line of success, and it's very bumpy. It's a lot of ups and downs and there's so much learning going on. I want them to know that their coaches are here for them and to utilize us. We're not just about the golf. I want to always be there for my players. 

Coach Melissa Luellen smiles as she watches her players on the course. (Photo courtesy of Melissa Luellen)

WU: Over these last few years, women’s golf has clearly expanded greatly. So I was wondering, from your perspective, can you point to any specific motivating factors that you believe have helped to fuel this growth in women’s golf? And do you have any ideas on how to build on these things to further the prominence of women’s golf?

LUELLEN: So I think a couple of things. I think that when the NCAA tournament started to be televised and went to match play, the exposure that's given women's college golf has been enormous. I think because of that the folks at Augusta National, you know, decided that they want to give back to Junior golf and they want to give back to golf, and they picked two areas: Junior golf with the Drive, Chip and Putt and women's golf. I never thought in my lifetime we would see a women's amateur event played at Augusta National, and it really is a huge game changer. When people are out there and they're watching these women play, they're so impressed. 

The people that have an influence in this game are doing the right things to grow the game. And so to answer the second part of it, it's really just continuing to get young girls interested in the game. Golf has to be fun. You have to have other little girl buddies to keep you in it. I think a lot of us in my era -- there weren't very many girls playing -- grew up playing a lot with boys. I still think it's great to play with boys and compete and play with people who are better than you and learn what it feels like to compete and be under pressure. But I think just continuing to bring young girls in, and I think that being on TV, they see girls that are role models. Little girls that are introduced to golf, like, “wow, I could do that.” And there's girls on my team that as little girls, they’ve dreamed of being a pro golf golfer, and there's a few of them I think can have a great career doing it.

WU: If there is one thing you could change about women’s golf today, what would it be?

LUELLEN: It’s gotten so good. I just feel like we're continuing to be on an upward trajectory that, I guess, continued exposure for people to understand how good these players are. And of course, you see on the LPGA, the prize money is growing, but it's still a far cry from the men. If both organizations were one, like professional tennis where the men and the women get paid the same because they're the same organization. If the PGA Tour and the LPGA Tour were to ever merge and really help each other, I think that would be amazing. So I think that's one thing that could change that could make it better for the women.

WU: Have you observed any prejudices in this sport, either personally or through your players, that place female golfers at a disadvantage? And if so, what are they?

LUELLEN: So I think that there's still some stigmas that women aren't that talented or they don't hit it far enough. I think that's just something that's not true anymore. I think when people who don't really understand women's collegiate golf, when they see it, they're like, “oh, wow”. It's just eye opening for them. Like “I can't believe how far they hit the ball.” So I think just continuing that exposure.

 I think that there are a lot of Asian players that have come to the LPGA, and I think maybe golf fans don't really embrace that, but they're so talented. And there's many European basketball players that are in the league that doesn't seem to be a problem, so I think that the Asians get picked on a little bit, and I think it's unfair. But it's like, you're there because you're great at your craft. And if people want to see good golf, it doesn't matter what the name is on the back. It's how they're performing. 

WU: What encouragement would you give to any female golfer who is facing gender discrimination in this sport, either from male opponents, coaches, or from the system in general? 

LUELLEN: I think it's great to find a role model and maybe even reach out to some different role models. People that have had experience and success, they're happy to share. You just have to reach out and ask. It doesn't matter if it's Nelly Korda or whoever. She's on Instagram and you could direct message her and she might actually reply back. I think having a mentor and asking them questions and learning from people that have been where you want to be.

WU: What message do you have for young girls who are considering whether or not to take up golf?

LUELLEN: Well, I think that if they're young, they should be interested in any kind of sport or any kind of activity. Do a lot of different things when you're young. Get exposure. I mean, if you don't play golf at the collegiate level, you can still play golf and enjoy it. For anyone that ever played the game, it's really hard. And it's one of the challenges that we love, and everybody's bad when you start. So it's such a rewarding sport because you do it yourself. You don't have anybody else that's doing it for you. You've got people that support you, like a coach or a mentor and your parents. But at the end of the day, you're the one putting the work in and you're the one reaping the rewards or having to deal with failure. It's a great teacher of life and when things go well, there's nothing better, and when things are hard, it teaches you a lot about who you are as a person and teaches you resilience and how to dig in. If you decide to play at a competitive level, you have to accept that it's going to be a challenge. But I think anyone that plays actually loves that it's not the same every day. 

WU: On a final note, as someone who has played professional golf, what advice would you have for any girls who are interested in going down the same path? Is there anything they should know beforehand that isn’t always obvious?

LUELLEN: Number one, you have to dream. You have to ask for what you want. I don't know that everybody has to have the goal of being number one, because you can have a lot of success on the tour and not be number one. So I think it's okay to not want to be number one, but I think you can strive to be like the best player that you can be. And it takes a lot of time. It takes a lot of sacrifice, a lot of time away from friend activities. But that's called dedication. And it doesn't mean that you live by golf alone. My mom always said, “one does not live by golf alone.” But when you get a little obsessed with this game, it can really grab you. When I was competing, I did not have any other hobby, and that's not very healthy. So I would always recommend that even while you're really working hard and trying to become the best golfer and pursuing professional golf, that you don't tie your self esteem or your value with your golf score. You have different compartments of your life, it's [golf’s] something that you do, it does not define if you're a good person or a bad person based on if you shot 80 or 70.