NORMAN – Following one of the most productive seasons in program history, Oklahoma head men’s golf coach Ryan Hybl was named the winner Dave Williams Award, given annually to the national coach of the year the Golf Coaches Association of America announced Monday.
The award is the first for Hybl, the two-time Big 12 coach of the year, who has orchestrated one of the best program rebuilds in college golf history in his 13 years in Norman. This season, Hybl led the Sooners to a school record-tying seven team wins, including the program’s 18th Big 12 championship. Oklahoma finished the season as the consensus No. 1 team in the nation, finishing on top of all three major polls.
“I am honored and humbled to be the recipient of the Dave Williams Award,” Hybl said. “I’m not honored because of anything I’ve done, but because we as a program are getting recognized as one of the best programs in all of college golf. For that, we are excited and proud of the honor and recognition.”
The 2021-22 Sooners opened the year ranked 14th in the Golfweek poll but quickly ascended to the No. 1 spot following September’s win at the Maridoe Collegiate Invitational. Oklahoma then knocked off Pepperdine and Oklahoma State in match play to win the prestigious East Lake Cup for the first time in program history to close the fall.
The spring slate brought the most dominant two-tournament stretch in program history. The Sooners posted a school record 59-under par to win the Puerto Rico Classic, followed by a 38-under winning performance at Southern Highlands the week after. Oklahoma played those six rounds a combined 97-under par, an NCAA record, and posted four of the school’s lowest 10 rounds ever during the stretch. A win at the regular-season finale Thunderbird Collegiate, where the Sooners erased a final-round, five-shot deficit to upset No. 4 Arizona State on their home course, marked the team’s fifth win of the year.
Entering the postseason as the nation’s No. 1 seed, the Sooners battled with three other top-10 teams in the nation’s best golf conference to win their 18th conference crown and second of the Hybl era. Awarded an NCAA Regional on late notice, Oklahoma defended its home course to notch its seventh and final win of the season when it won the NCAA Norman Regional by 10 strokes. At the team’s 11th consecutive national championship, Oklahoma surged in front of the field before faltering on the final day and finishing in a tie for first in the stroke-play portion of the tournament. The Crimson and Cream eventually fell in extra holes of the final match to national runner-up Arizona State in the NCAA quarterfinal. Still, the Sooners became the only team in the country to appear in six consecutive NCAA match plays.
On the individual front, Hybl brought in Rutgers transfer Chris Gotterup who entered the season outside of the nation’s top 60 and finished as the school’s first Fred Haskins Award winner, given annually to the nation’s best golfer. Gotterup also won the Jack Nicklaus National Player of the Year honor and was a PING first-team All-America selection. In addition, senior and co-captain Logan McAllister earned a PING first-team nod, while freshman Drew Gotterup was honored on the national All-Freshman team. The first-team All-America honors for Gotterup and McAllister marked the second time in program history that two Sooners were honored on the PING first team, joining Quade Cummins and Garett Reband in 2020.
The Sooners posted the second-lowest single-season scoring average in program history of 280.95 (-5.20), which trailed only the 2019-20 team that played a shortened season. The final ranking of No. 1 marked the first time since 1989 that the Sooners finished the year on top of all national polls.
Hybl joins Gregg Grost, who won the award after leading Oklahoma to its first national championship in 1989, as the only Sooner coach to win the nation’s most prestigious coaching award. In addition, Oklahoma’s coaching staff now features both the reigning national head and assistant coaches of the year as OU assistant Bill Allcorn won the 2021 Jan Strickland Award for national assistant coach of the year – the 2022 honor will be announced in July.