By Mike Lehman, TTU Sports activities Info
COOKEVILLE, Tenn. – A person practically synonymous with Tennessee Tech males’s golf will keep on the helm of the Golden Eagle program for not less than the following 5 seasons, as TTU Director of Athletics Mark Wilson introduced a contract extension for head coach Polk Brown by the 2027-28 season.
“Polk has Tennessee Tech purple and gold coursing by his veins,” Tech Director of Athletics Mark Wilson mentioned. “We’re thrilled to have a person as passionate for golf, teachers, and most significantly, this campus, these student-athletes, and this group as he’s. Polk has continued to construct this program right into a constant contender and I do know he’ll proceed to do nice issues sooner or later.”
Coming into his thirteenth season on the helm of the Tech males’s, Brown can also be in his third as an assistant for the ladies’s golf program after serving as its head coach for 10 seasons. He moved into an assistant position for the ladies’s crew following the elevation of former assistant coach Amanda Smith into the pinnacle position in July 2021. Brown was named the primary full-time head coach of each Golden Eagle packages in July 2011.
“I’m so grateful for the assumption that Mark Wilson and his administration have proven in me to have led this program these 13 years,” Brown expressed, “and to now have the chance to be right here even longer is such a blessing. I really like this program, this college, and this metropolis a lot. I am honored to have the ability to give again to the group, these younger women and men, and simply the sport of golf as an entire. I am so excited for what the long run goes to convey.”
Brown was the second-longest tenured coach within the historical past of the ladies’s squad and is third-longest on the boys’s facet. Solely the legendary Corridor of Famer Bobby Nichols, who established the ladies’s program in 1986, coached the crew longer (22 years). On the boys’s facet, Nichols led this system for 34 years whereas one other Tech Corridor of Famer, Raymond “Bull” Brown, served as head coach for 19 seasons.
The Tennessee Tech grad and males’s golf alum collected his first profession Ohio Valley Convention Coach of the Yr honors following the 2021-22 marketing campaign because the Golden Eagles completed the 12 months with a program-record and league-leading scoring common of 289.96. The Golden Eagles completed because the OVC’s runner-up, securing the No. 1 seed within the first-ever match-play portion of the league’s championship. The purple and gold turned in 4 runner-up showings on the 12 months, together with every of the ultimate three tournaments in the course of the 12 months.
In his time on the helm of the boys’s program, he has coached eight people to a mixed 10 All-OVC honors, together with two-time recipients Mitch Thomas and Jackson Skeen. Seven Golden Eagles have gone on to earn OVC All-Newcomer accolades beneath Brown’s steering whereas 5 have claimed spots on the OVC All-Event Staff. In the course of the 2021-22 season, Jackson Skeen was honored because the OVC’s Freshman of the Yr.
In 2022-23, Skeen earned simply the second at-large choice to take part as a person on the NCAA Males’s Golf Championships in program historical past. Skeen additionally broke this system’s regular-season scoring common report, posting a mark of 70.96 earlier than his journey to the NCAA Event.
Throughout his tenure, the Tech males have mixed to win 50 All-Event nods, 4 particular person medalist honors, and 4 match titles. The Golden Eagle males’s squad has completed within the prime 5 of the OVC Championships 5 instances, together with runner-up performances in 2015 and 2022.
Among the many males’s program information which have been set beneath Brown’s course embrace the all-time crew scoring marks for each 18 and 54 holes, in addition to the season scoring common report. The Golden Eagles have additionally posted 4 of the 5 lowest crew season scoring averages since he took over in 2011.
Below Brown’s watch, the Tech girls’s program noticed 4 members declare All-OVC honors, two mix for 3 OVC All-Event accolades, and one earn a spot on the OVC All-Newcomer Staff. A complete of 32 Golden Eagles collected All-Event honors throughout his tenure as head coach, with a pair profitable medalist honors as properly. He additionally guided the crew to a pair of match titles and three top-five finishes on the OVC Championships, together with a runner-up exhibiting in 2016.
His girls’s groups set program information for 18-, 36-, and 54-hole scores each as a crew and individually. The ladies additionally established every of the top-six crew season scoring averages beneath Brown’s course, together with the highest exhibiting of 308.27 in the course of the 2016-17 marketing campaign.
A four-year letterman beneath Nichols, Brown performed for the Golden Eagles from 2001 to 2006, with a redshirt season in 2003-04. As a participant, he earned all-tournament honors 3 times throughout his profession, together with the Mercer Invitational as a freshman and the EKU Spring Invitational as a senior. A crew captain in his remaining 12 months, he completed fifth on the 2006 Ohio Valley Convention Event to assert his third all-tournament honor. In 2001-02 he gained the Most Improved Participant Award and the Impression Award, and in 2005-06 he obtained the crew’s Most Devoted Participant Award.
Brown obtained his bachelor’s diploma in finance from Tech in 2006, and accomplished his coursework in August 2011, including his grasp’s diploma in curriculum and instruction. He spent his first 12 months after commencement as an Apprentice at Holston Hills Nation Membership in Knoxville, then returned to high school in 2009 to start working towards his grasp’s.
Picture by Emily Armstrong
