Women Wildcats Ready For Fall Golf Season

Linfield’s fall season begins Sept. 16th with the first of five tournaments including all five Oregon members of the Northwest Conference.

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MCMINNVILLE - Linfield’s fall season begins Sept. 16th with the first of five tournaments including all five Oregon members of the Northwest Conference.

Leslie Wheeler, Northwest Conference champion in 2005 and runner-up in 2006, returns to lead the 2006-07 Linfield women’s golf team.

Letterwomen Rachel Warwick and Shawnie Dakan also return, but other than that, new coach Karly Mills Cramer will not know much about her team until new players turn out.

But Mills Cramer, a former Oregon state amateur champion, award-winning University of Oregon player and University of Portland coach, knows what she wants to accomplish with this and future Wildcat golf teams.

“Golf provides tools these student-athletes can use for the rest of their lives, not just here and now,” Mills Cramer says.

“We hope to develop these young women to use the sport for business and pleasure and to open opportunities for themselves in the future.”

Mills Cramer has done that herself. She is a successful home mortgage consultant in McMinnville and is coaching part-time.

Mills Cramer was Oregon’s Most Valuable Player in 1994 and the Ducks’ Most Inspirational Player in ’95, when she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in sociology. She was Oregon women’s amateur champion in 1994She replaces former Linfield athlete Marty Bergan, who retired after eight seasons as coach. Bergan’s teams won four consecutive Northwest Conference championships from 2000-2003 and finished in third place in 2005-06.

Top returnee Wheeler averaged 83.5 strokes per round last season, shooting her best score of 78 in her final round at the conference championship. Warwick averaged 92.8 and Dakan 100.2.

“We are looking forward to seeing what we have among the incoming freshmen and testing the waters,” Mills Cramer said. She already has received lots of interest from future high school graduates.

“We will be a fairly young team for a couple of years,” she said.

Linfield’s fall season begins Sept. 16th with the first of five tournaments including all five Oregon members of the Northwest Conference. The championship is determined by competition both in the fall and next spring, concluding with the NWC championship in mid-April.

Linfield is host to one tournament at Michelbook Country Club on Sept. 25th.

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